The Adventures Of Harry Potter, the Video Game: Exploited
by michaelsuave
Summary: Harry Potter catches Voldemort's AK to the noggin only to find out that his life is a video game and he forgot to save. So what does he do? Does he return on Hard mode and work for the challenge? Heck No! Harry uses every exploit, grind, or underhanded tactic he can get his hands on. His life may be a video game, but nobody plays Harry Potter; Harry's going to exploit the system.
1. Chapter 1: Game Over

Harry Potter the Video Game: Exploited

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or the characters of his universe, I just play in that sandbox for fun and without pay or any form of remuneration other than reviews and private messages; which are fortunately non-taxable.

******AN: If you were stuck in a video game, would you make it as difficult as possible if your life was on the line? Hell no! You would exploit that sucker for all that it was worth. Game mechanics were meant to be milked for every advantage you can get. Grind those skills, power-level that bugger and explore every nook and cranny for secrets that could help you survive and kick the ever loving piss out of your enemies. Just like Conan or Genghis khan said, you goal is to vanquish your enemies and chase them before you, to rob them of their wealth and see those dear to them bathed in tears, to ride their horses and clasp to your bosom their wives and daughters. Anyway, I'm sure there is a corollary for Harry Potter and his quest for success somewhere in there. This may be a one-shot, it may be something more someday, but I wanted to get it out of my head and onto paper. Be warned that there is foul language used in this story, and I don't know about any relationships in the future. Either way, this is totally written for fun. I hope you enjoy it. Cheers!**

******AN: 10/13/13 Beta-read by ****Vandenbz**

* * *

'_Thoughts are in italics'_

"Things Said, or Things Written"

******Chapter: 1 Game Over**

Standing in the clearing in the middle of the Forbidden Forest, Death Eaters gathered about, and Voldemort's killing curse flying right for Harry's noggin, Harry closed his eyes and hoped for the best.

The curse hit, and Harry's world went black.

That is, until the giant green glowing letters of **GAME OVER** flashed in front of him as if on a giant movie screen.

****And to add insult to injury, a poorly programmed 8-bit computer graphic of a destroyed Hogwarts castle was illuminated by lightning flashing in the background as flocks of pixilated ravens circled the crumbling ruins of the place Harry had called home. And all that time, the words GAME OVER continued to dominate the middle of Harry's awareness.

Harry found himself standing at the base of what appeared to be a movie screen, or a large flat version of the Hogwart's ceiling, but with the words GAME OVER displayed in front of him where now additional words began to be portrayed in front of his quickly paling complexion.

"GAME OVER, sorry, it appears you did not save your game, would you like to start a new game?" Read the words on the screen.

Harry was completely flummoxed.

Gobsmacked.

Speechless – for all of fifteen minutes, and then Harry let loose a string of expletives so foul that they would have singed Hagrid's hairy ears and even caused the Dark Lord Voldemort to cry out "Language!"

Harry's long spew of cursing finally ended with one more decidedly nasty and detailed expletive.

"Merlin's saggy crab infested nutsack! My life was a bloody video game! And a _badly__programmed_ one at that!" Harry cried out into the darkness above him and shook his fists at whatever unseen fate or divinity had decided to mock him and his pain.

Spitting profanities and kicking imaginary rocks while flailing his fists like he was fighting unseen aggressors, Harry let loose with more expletives as the futility of his life was presented to him via a giant video game screen.

"Fucking fuck you fucking fucks for fucking with my fucking fucked up fuck of a life! A Video Game!? Really?!" His teenaged voice cracked at the last statement, kind of ruining the sense of righteous indignation as he continued to curse at the darkness around him. Harry wasn't one to normally curse in life, but considering that he was dead he figured he could make an exception just this once.

The enormity of the situation hit Harry like a ton of bricks, and he eventually stopped thrashing around and just stared at the screen with its message. There was no continuing, there was no going back, his life as he knew it was over. A part of him didn't know whether to be happy or sad given the fact that he had given up and figured he was dead one way or the other when he headed into the forest.

Still, to have it blatantly shoved in his face felt a bit wrong if not raw.

The screen changed, obviously tired of waiting for an answer and suddenly a happy tune filled with lots of melodic chiming theme music and "Do, do do, DO Dooo, do, do, dee do dee do" began to play as the main menu for the video game that was Harry's life, popped up.

"The Adventures of Harry Potter" Read across the top of the screen in large letters, with a lightning bolt as part of the P in Potter. A column of other all capitalized words were below in large bold letters.

******NEW GAME, CONTINUE, LOAD A SAVED GAME, OPTIONS**

The words were displayed one above the other, yet Continue and Load a Saved Game were both grayed out, whereas New Game and Options were both lit up and available.

Harry blinked, and looked around him, yet the unmoving darkness around him remained in its constant state while the annoying theme music to his life continued to repeat like some cheap midi file of canned electronic music.

With a huff, Harry plopped himself down on the black invisible like surface he seemed to be standing on. Sitting at first, and then sprawled out on his back in a huff, Harry flipped two fingers in a V towards the sky.

"Screw you! I won't do it." Harry petulantly cursed, glaring up into the unfathomable depths of shadow.

And still no answer was given.

And still the stupid music repeated, over, and over, and over again.

Finally Harry couldn't stand it anymore, the monotony getting to him.

"BAAAAAAH!" Harry screamed in rage and threw a temper tantrum, thrashing his feet and hands against the unseen surface beneath his prone figure; like a toddler throwing a temper tantrum in the middle of the grocer's aisle because he couldn't get his super sugar-bomb-teeth-rot cereal. Well he threw a temper tantrum, but in a more adult and brooding way that seems to be popular in angsty teen dramas, though Harry didn't have any of the cuteness of a toddler, and really it's just kind of embarrassing when a young adult does that kind of thing.

Harry sat up and glared at the screen.

"Fine, we will play things your way, but if you think I'm going to like it or do things the exact same way as the last time, then you are sadly mistaken." Harry growled. "No way am I starting this over without knowing what options I have."

With Harry's statement of "options" the Options menu button flashed and a new menu popped up with several new opportunities.

******DIFFICULTY, CONTROLS, CHEAT CODES, RETURN TO MAIN MENU**

"Screw you game, if you think I'm going to play it by your rules, you're wrong! Cheat codes." Harry ordered, and the cheat menu popped up.

The only problem was that the cheat menu was blank. A whole screen of: **?, ?, ?,**... continued in a list down the page, and a notice written in red letters that "cheat codes can only be unlocked by exploring the world and collecting enough golden snitches from throughout the levels."

Harry blinked, and then silently thrust his hand straight up over his head, two fingers straight up in a V and the rest clutched in a fist that was going white with the force he was using to clench said fist.

"Back to Options, and Difficulty." Harry growled through his teeth and lowered his hand.

"Difficulty level: HARD" Was highlighted at the top.

Below that were several other sections, which had a whole lot of the word "NO" highlighted next to them, and only two "YES".

TUTORIAL HINTS was highlighted as "NO," MINI-MAP was highlighted as "NO," AUTOSAVE was highlighted as "NO," HIS MOTHER'S EYES was highlighted as "NO," while "PERMA-DEATH" was highlighted as "YES" along with "BOUND MAGIC" also being marked with a "YES."

Harry blinked, and then blinked again, and then looked upwards with an angry glare and insulting gesture thrust at the sky with both hands, "Screw… You." Harry drawled out slowly.

"Tutorial hints Yes, mini-map Yes, autosave Yes, perma-death No, bound magic No," Harry ordered petulantly as those were pretty obvious based on their statements, or at least seemed helpful to turn on. That left him with the less than helpful descriptor that was left.

"And what the hell is His Mother's Eyes?" Harry groused; the previously checked boxes changing on all except for his mother's eyes, where a help box popped up with a question mark in it.

The box clearly stated, "Harry Potter looks just like his father, but has his mother's eyes. His mother had 20/20 vision, but his father didn't. Would you like to make the game more difficult and make Harry blind without his glasses yet have the rest of his vision genetics come from his mother? Yes, or No?"

"Thestral Shit! Really? Really?! You had to go and fuck with me some more? And why didn't anybody ever think of the fact that if I get my eye shape and color from my mother, then why don't I have her vision? God wizards are blind to common sense, and apparently I was too. Yes I want my mother's eyes." Harry ended with a shout that saw spittle fly from his mouth and disappear across the dark surface under his feet.

The help box disappeared and now HIS MOTHER'S EYES was clicked Yes.

"Difficulty level, Easy." Harry commanded, only for a help box to pop up.

"Easy difficulty level is only available after beating Normal, Hard, or Insane difficulty campaigns, would you like to try Insane difficulty?" The not helpful at all 'help box' read from its place on the screen.

Harry clenched his nails into the palms of his fists as he crossed his arms and glared at the screen, "Oh, now I know you are just fucking with me. Normal mode you bloody wanker."

The menu changed the difficulty level to show Normal difficulty now, so at least some things were looking to be going in the right direction, even if it was turning out that Harry's life was one big cosmic joke.

"Before we start the so called game, wanker, back to Options menu and let me see this Controls section." Harry huffed, arms still crossed in front of his chest and foot tapping in unspent silent rage.

"CONTROLS" the screen read in large letters, before giving simple instructions below it.

"At any point you can initiate any of these functions by merely making a command:

******Inventory**, you can access the full range of Harry's possessions at any time via the Inventory command. A listing of the money you acquire, Galleons or Pounds, can be found and accessed via the inventory menu.

******Camera View**, by using the Camera View command you can change the game from first person to third person view.

******Map**, you can access a version of the Marauders' Map of the region you are in via the Map command, though it will only show the areas you have explored and the individuals you have acquainted yourself with. All other areas unexplored areas will be fogged out.

******Library**, At any time you can access your quest journal, list of spells, or any books or materials you have read by using the Library command.

******Crafting**, creating potions, working runes and enchantments, farming, and cooking can all be accomplished by activating the Crafting menu.

******Special Powers**, throughout your game you may earn powers, perks or even curses that you can activate via the Special Powers menu or by calling out the name of the special power. Some powers, perks, curses etc. are always active or will only activate in particular circumstances.

******Stats**, at any time you can access your Character Statistics by using the Stats command. This lets you see your base attributes, health, magic supply, etc."

Harry just shook his head in disgust, "And you didn't think it would have been helpful for me to know this shite before when I was apparently living out my life?" Harry asked hypothetically, not expecting an answer and not receiving one anyway.

Harry stared at the screen for a few more minutes, silent thoughts running through his head as it was all a bit overwhelming that he had lived, died, and then discovered that it was all some sort of big game.

Still, he thought to himself, Harry Potter didn't give up, and Harry Potter didn't surrender; he was going to conveniently ignore the part where he had willingly walked into the Forbidden Forest and basically asked Voldemort to Avada Kedavra him in the face.

Finally, after an indeterminate amount of time of standing in the dark, the happy melodramatic music playing on repeat in the background, Harry finally ordered the screen back to the Main Menu.

"Ok you bastards, start a New Game." Harry ordered, and then the screen flashed, and Harry's world went black.

* * *

Harry was helpless as he looked on as if a narrator was playing out the life that he was born into. His parents joined the Order of the Phoenix, they fought beside adults that Harry recognized from his previous life, and Harry even saw his parents stand in battle against the Death Eaters and Voldemort himself, and live to tell about it three times.

Images and montages flew before Harry's eyes. His birth and early life as an infant were shown to him as if he was outside a window viewing into a house. His parents, clearly in love with each other and the infant Harry, cradled him together at their house in Godric's Hollow. Then the image changed to show James Potter and Lily Potter joined by their three friends Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew; all of them smiling and cooing around the newborn Harry Potter.

Harry attempted to speak, attempted to shout out about the coming actions of the traitor, but in his formless void as a visitor, he was only able to look in, he was helpless.

Pictures flew by quickly, almost too fast for his subconscious to take in as his parents met with Dumbledore and went into hiding, the casting of the Fidelius Charm by Dumbledore with Sirius as the secret keeper. The house seemed to wink out of existence before Dumbledore disappeared with a pop, only for Lily Potter, the smartest witch of her age, to take out her wand and point at the missing house and tap Sirius on the nose before then totransfer the secret over to Peter Pettigrew.

And then it was that night, and Harry Potter was forced to watch as his parents were slaughtered and his Mother blessed him and sacrificed her life as a part of a ritual that would save Harry's life from the Killing Curse; but apparently on Hard mode the sacrifice only worked once given the AK that had led Harry to witnessing this scene again.

Brief flashes of a motorcycle ride through the sky, a whiskered face smiling large on the screen before Harry's vision, and then, darkness.

* * *

A pounding on the door woke Harry up, causing him to become aware of his surroundings.

First thing of note was, Harry was small.

"Stats." Harry commanded, only to get a message saying, "Current level: ruddy little bugger, go through the tutorial and first missions before gaining any information."

Growling to himself, Harry pulled himself up to a sitting position.

Looking around, Harry recognized his surroundings immediately; he was in his cupboard under the stairs at Number 4 Privet Drive.

"Bloody hell." Harry mumbled to himself as he rubbed his eyes, only to realize that he could see perfectly and was not wearing any glasses.

This brought the first smile to Harry's face since he had decided to go visit Voldemort and the Death Eaters in the forest.

The smile lasted for all of three seconds, for that was how long it took before the door to the cupboard was thrown open. Vernon Dursley's meaty hand reached in and forcibly dragged Harry out of his cupboard by Harry's overly large T-shirt.

"Come on boy, enough lazing about. It's time for you to get up and make breakfast. And don't make me say it a second time." The large oafish man stated before settling Harry on his feet none too gently. And cuffing Harry on the back of the head.

Harry felt the jarring sensation twinge up his legs from Vernon dropping him, and it hurt a bit, followed by the cuff to the back of the head that set the room spinning briefly, but not enough that Harry would complain.

"Dee-Do" A chiming sound seemed to tinkle in Harry's ear as a bubble of text popped up in Harry's vision, along with a row of hearts along the bottom of Harry's vision. Out of the ten hearts Harry had, only two and a half of them were flashing red, the rest were greyed out as if Harry had taken some damage or wasn't even close to fully healed. The text bubble that popped up in front of Harry seemed to suggest the same, and Harry smiled through the pain as he noticed Vernon waddle off seemingly unaware of the text bubble that Harry could clearly see.

"You've been hurt." The text bubble helpfully supplied details that were obvious to Harry, but such was the way of tutorial menus usually. The text bubble then began to scroll upwards and went into more detail. "In your current malnourished and injured state you need food, healing potions, or spells to get back to your full health. Hearts are damaged or gained in quarters, and the average human can take a lot of damage if they are fully healed. Due to your upbringing, that state of health is a long way off. Head to the kitchen for your first cooking crafting quest where you can learn about preparing food." With that, the text bubble disappeared after Harry finished reading it. The few red and multiple grey hearts continued to stay in the bottom of his vision.

"Well that was helpful." Harry mumbled sarcastically to himself; not liking the factthat even the tutorial seemed to be insulting his state of being, even if it was true.

"What was that boy?" Vernon's voice issued out of the kitchen.

"Nothing. Coming Uncle." Harry hurriedly answered. There wasn't much else Harry could do in his situation given that he weighed roughly equivalent to Vernon Dursley's left calf and only came up to the obese man's waist. Besides the chance of accidental magic, Harry was all sorts of out of luck, but he was hopeful that it would change soon.

Harry moved into the kitchen and noticed a glowing exclamation point hanging in the air above the kitchen stove. Looking incredulously at his aunt, cousin and uncle who were all seated at the table, either they couldn't see the exclamation point or they were too dumb to notice. The jury was still out on that question, and probably would be for some time.

Shrugging to himself, Harry made his way over to the stove and stepped up onto the footstool that was situated so he could reach all the burner space. The moment Harry stepped on the foot stool, the crafting/cooking module popped up in front of him with a list of available ingredients and food to be prepared and the mission parameters for how much food he was supposed to make. A mini-game of sorts was set out on the stove which included: stirring, flipping, ingredients and tools by which to make the food. Out of the corner of Harry's eye he noticed that the world around him seemed to freeze as his aunt, uncle and cousin were seemingly frozen in time.

And that's when the tutorial popped up with some interesting information, and Harry's Slytherin side came to the forefront of his mind.

"Help with cooking: For this crafting mission you are supposed to make five servings of perfect bacon, ten waffles, ten pieces of toast, one pot of tea, one pot of coffee, and one carafe of orange juice. Because your crafting cooking skill is only Novice level, you may burn or partially ruin the food several times before making a perfect serving. Ruined food may still be consumed for partial health regeneration, but only perfect food will complete the mission and perfect food causes you to regain hearts more quickly. All perfect food will help you advance your cooking skills at least one point per perfect serving. Ruined food will only advance your skill half as much as a perfect serving of the food recipe would. You may retain food in your inventory indefinitely without worrying about it spoiling or going cold/tepid. Some foods offer additional benefits or negatives when imbibing, such as coffee which adds a temporary bonus to your stamina but may stunt your ability to gain points to your Athletics growth for a period of time. Due to this mission being your first crafting experience, you may make as many attempts at cooking as you like until you meet the mission requirements; you have unlimited ingredients and food supplies with which to make your meal. Future crafting cooking missions will have limited ingredients to make the required portions, the reward for failure being a frying-pan blow to the head while success gives you experience points and possibly rewards. Increasing your crafting level makes perfect successes easier to achieve. Some crafting recipes require a specific crafting skill level tobe already achieved. Additional recipes can be learned by reading the right skill or crafting books or from a skill trainer. Good luck!"

Harry looked at the words floating helpfully in front of him, and blinked. Then he blinked again. And then an evil smile formed on his lips.

Harry Potter had a wicked idea. What would happen if he purposefully burned or ruined as much food as he could? What would happen if he just tediously burned every waffle, over crisped the bacon and purposefully ruined the food? Why, then he could stock his inventory full of ruined food and never go hungry again!

And thus Harry Potter was introduced to the idea of video game exploits and skill grinding in the first moments of controlling his new life.

* * *

What seemed like a good 24 hours of monotonous cooking to Harry seemed to pass in no time at all to the outside world. The room around Harry appeared just as it had when he began, and it was still that first morning's breakfast to the rest of the world. And yet, Harry had just finished crafting his one thousandth ruined waffle. He turned and called out "Inventory!"

A floating magically expanded chest seemed to materialize in the air in front of Harry and he smirked as he put the ruined and slightly misshapen waffle on top of the stack of other similarly ruined waffles that were piled up in stacks of one hundred waffles each; a seeming limit to any stack of items in his inventory yet each stack only took up one space in the inventory. Next to the stack of waffles were stacks of blackened bacon, several stacks of pitchers of slightly green looking orange juice and another section of even more stacks of blackened toast. In the bottom of Harry's vision ten red glowing hearts shined back at Harry as he had already eaten his fill of his ruined food. A rosy glow shone from Harry's cheeks and he looked less skeletal than he had when he had woken up that morning. Additionally, by this point it was actually getting difficult for Harry to burn the toast or the bacon, and making a bad waffle actually took more skill than making a perfect one. Alas, such was the problem one had when they had crafted until their skill level rose time and time again until it couldn't rise any more.

Harry had been introduced to how to grind skills, and it really was a grind as it was incredibly boring. Still, all of those hours of weeding the lawn or polishing Uncle Vernon's car in his previous life had held Harry in good stead in that mind-numbing boredom wasn't something Harry couldn't deal with. Still, the mini game had gotten easier and easier as Harry's Cooking skill had gone up point by point, which was slowed by the fact that he was only making ruined food. Harry had also learned that cooking waffles or bacon actually provided more skill points than just toasting bread or squeezing oranges; though making tea definitely took some skill even if it was mostly a glorified form of boiling water. Ultimately Harry's cooking crafting skill had topped out to where he couldn't gain any more levels, a "Ding" and glowing light surrounding him with a sudden breeze told him he now rated as a "Master Chef" level even if Harry's repertoire of recipes was decidedly limited.

Harry smiled to himself, "Not bad to go from Novice to Master Chef all in the process of making one breakfast." With that, Harry commanded his inventory to close, and the floating chest that was his inventory system disappeared without a sound.

Harry cracked his neck and turned to look at the Dursleys, noting that they sat still as stone or as if they had been paralyzed by a basilisk. The morning sun still filtered down through the semi-cloudy English sky and in through the glass doors that were next to the kitchen table, and everything stayed just as it had been when Harry started this crafting mission. The work had been boring, but it was sure rewarding to Harry. And now he didn't have to worry about the Dursley's starving him as he had stocked up on loads of food; even if it was of the ruined or slightly burned variety.

With an off tune whistle Harry got back to work making the actual meal that the quest commanded, and in almost no time at all, Master Chef Harry Potter had the required stacks of waffles, servings of bacon, toast, orange juice and tea all ready for his family.

"Ding!" A sound chimed in the air above Harry's head as the words "Quest completed, + 25 Experience" flashed before Harry's eyes, as the crafting mode shut off and the world began to move once again around Harry.

"Hurry up with that food, boy." Vernon grouched.

Harry just smiled and silently served the food, his aunt giving Harry two pieces of toast to be Harry's breakfast. Harry just smiled and nodded as he backed away.

"Your list of choresison the fridge, now go outside and work, I don't want you inside when the women from my book club arrive." His Aunt Petunia commanded.

And Harry responded with a "Yes Ma'am" while turning and calling out "Inventory" under his breath. The trunk appeared and dutifully followed Harry to the refrigerator as Harry stored his two pieces of perfect toast in a new slot.

The inventory trunk disappeared silently again, Harry grabbed his list of chores and ran out the front door; his uncle yelling not to run in the hall, but Harry ignored the man on his way to freedom and the great outdoors.

* * *

Upon stepping out the front doors to Number 4 Privet Drive, a number of things flashed before Harry.

First, the words "Auto-save" flashed in the middle of Harry's vision, making him smile as at least this time he wouldn't have to start from scratch if he somehow died.

Second, in the bottom right corner of his vision a bar appeared that was a full green color the whole way across. In the top right corner of his vision a circle with a compass point of N for north appeared with a line drawing of the front yard of the Dursley's house, a sketch of the interior walls of the house, and three white dots that seemed to be sitting in the kitchen area of the house.

"Dee-Do" Chimed in Harry's ear again, the sound that Harry was beginning to associate withwhenever a tutorial message popped up.

"So you want to go on an adventure?" The tutorial was labeled, before explaining that the green bar in the bottom right corner was Harry's stamina that would go up or down given how much exercise he did. The tutorial message was helpful in stating that if Harry exercised more or completed quests that relied on physical activity he could gain more stamina, use it less, or be able increase the range of physical capabilities he was able to do. Harry wasn't too happy about what he read next though.

"Welcome to normal mode. In normal mode, Harry Potter is a malnourished little wanker, so you start out with less stamina then normal children your age. Your stats are as follows:

******Level 1:**

******CURRENT EXP:** 25 **EXP NEEDED For NEXT LEVEL:**1000

******Health: 10/10**

******Magic: N/A**

******ABILITIES:**

Strength: 1

Dexterity: 3

Constitution: 1

Intelligence: 3

Wisdom: 2

Charisma: 1

******SKILLS:**

None

******CRAFTING:**

Cooking: Master Chef

"Good luck!" The tutorial finished flippantly.

Harry stopped his reading to glare up at the sky and flip it a two fingered salute in return before going back to reading the tutorial hints. Apparently somebody was having a laugh at his expense, but as it didn't seem he could do anything about it, he would just deal with the lot he had been handed.

"Mini-Map" the tutorial helpfully supplied regarding the circle in Harry's vision. It went on to explain that the white dots were people or creatures that Harry could interact with, and it stated that red dots constituted enemies that Harry should watch out for in his "piddly weak state." At that last statement, Harry again made an insulting gesture regarding the unseen observer in the sky's mother.

Harry stepped off the front stoop of his house and headed for the first exclamation point, a new tutorial message bubbled up in front of Harry and informed him of the next exploit he was going to take advantage of.

Ok, so it merely stated, "Missions, you may take quests and missions in whatever order you like. You cannot proceed in the story without completing certain missions, and other side missions will become unavailable to you if you progress the story too fast, so enjoy exploring."

"Map" Harry called out, and a floating image of the Marauder's Map popped up in front of him, showing the Dursley's house, the front street for about a block in either direction, and several glowing yellow exclamation points that Harry could look at right in front of Harry surrounding the Dursley's house. However there were several silver colored missions marked at other places in the bit of the neighborhood that Harry could currently see.

"The Kneazles in the bag" read one mission near Ms. Figg's house, next to another mission that read "Nine Lives" and "Herding Cats."

"That Delinquent Boy" read another quest mark near a neighbor's house down the way along with "We're Making Whoopie" in the back of a different neighbor's house and "A Hero's First Save" at the end of the block and just before the greyed out area of the map.

And then surrounding the Dursley house were several chore based quests that corresponded with the list that had been on the refrigerator. Still, it was the greyed out areas of the map that drew Harry's eyes.

And with that, and another conniving Slytherin smirk on his face, Harry decided he had plenty of time to shirk his chores and go exploring.

He was going to make the best of his life. There was a whole world to explore, and this time, Harry was going to exploit it for everything he could.

* * *

******AN: And just an idea for a story that I've had for a while and had to get out. Sure the video game Harry or Naruto stories are fun, but really, if it was your life that was on the line wouldn't you use every exploit, cheat, or underhanded tactic you could find in order to live and prosper? Why would anybody want to make it harder than it already was? Go wild I say! Bwa ha ha ha ha ha! Ahem, sorry, that's just my opinion. So this may be a one shot, or it may be something I continue at a later date. Hope you enjoyed it, let me know**


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or the characters of his universe, I just play in that sandbox for fun and without pay or any form of remuneration other than reviews and private messages; which are fortunately non-taxable.

**AN: Wow, 105 reviews for chapter one by the time I posted this. That made me smile a lot as I saw the numbers growing and the comments and ideas people gave me. So since I needed more fun and frivolity in my life I decided to write one more chapter. Really though, the number of reviews coming in helped me to come to that decision, and I really appreciate some of the ideas people gave me. Apparently people liked the idea of exploiting the ever living heck out of the video game mechanics of Harry's life. In some ways this is going to be a parody and humor based on Harry Potter canon, in others it is going to be poking fun at video game mechanics and the myriad ways that gamers take advantage of those mechanics. Personally, I love to exploit some games. Call it a personality flaw, but I cackle with delight when I can enable God Mode or find an exploit that enables me to steal a store bare during the night, just to sell the products back to the same store owner come morning light. This chapter, however, has to do with movement mechanics and basic combat. I hope you enjoy it and let me know if you think I should keep these chapters coming. This is basically a lark for me, so if it isn't fun then I'll just work on my other stories. Cheers!**

* * *

'_Thoughts are in italics'_

"Things Said, or Things Written"

**Chapter 2: A Jumping Fool**

A whole world to explore.

A new adventure over every horizon, ok, so at least around every block. That is, if Harry could even reach the end of the block without gasping for air.

"Gasp! Air! Give me Air!" Harry wheezed, trying not to fall over, as apparently the "ruddy little bugger" and "out of shape" type comments that the tutorial had stated about his malnourished and out of shape status were true.

In short, Harry had run out of stamina.

Hence why our intrepid main character was currently hacking up a lung while trying to inhale that sweet thing called oxygen.

"Merlin, I can't even go half a block without nearly dying." Harry wheezed, his hands on his knees and his head drooped as he was stooped over trying to catch his breath; his stamina meter slowly refilling after his half block run.

Originally upon exiting the Dursley's driveway the unknown shaded areas of Harry's Map had called to him with the siren's call of the unknown. Harry had immediately broken out in a sprint the moment he reached the sidewalk, only to see his stamina bar rapidly plummet.

And when that stamina bar emptied out Harry's energy level bottomed out also, causing him to almost collapse from an exhaustion that he had rarely if ever felt before in his life.

"Gasp, no fair, cough. I used to be able to outrun Dudley and his gang at this age all the time." Harry coughed and forced himself to stand up and start walking. Harry's stamina bar passed the half way mark and he was able to once again breathe normally. Slowly but surely Harry watched his stamina bar fill all the way until it was completely full.

"Dee-Do!" the chime of the tutorial box popped up in Harry's vision the moment his stamina bar filled back up. "Stamina and You!" The tutorial box was labeled.

"Stamina, this energy allows you to do physical feats such as running, jumping, dodging, climbing and fast swimming. Activities such as running or fast swimming use your stamina the quickest, whereas jumping and climbing take overall less stamina. You build your overall stamina by traveling distances, thus the faster you travel the faster your stamina will eventually grow. Your stamina bar will recharge normally, though certain items or potions can increase your stamina level or recharge rates. Another way to increase your stamina recharge is by increasing your overall strength. At stamina level 0, which you currently are, you will gain a level of stamina after covering one kilometer of ground. Each subsequent level of stamina requires you to travel further distances which increase with each level. You gain more total stamina for each level of stamina you gain. Additionally, for every five levels of stamina you gain, you will gain a +1 to your strength and subsequently a 10% increase in your stamina recharge rate. Now Have Fun!"

Harry frowned at the tutorial message as he finished reading it and it disappeared. "I think the cheery messages at the end of these tutorials is going to get to me sooner or later." He finished, before shaking his head and then moving from a walk to a run down the sidewalk again.

Harry's stamina bar dropped quickly as he sprinted down the path.

That is, it dropped quickly until one of Ms. Fig's cats ran out of the bushes in front of Harry and forced Harry to Jump over it otherwise face a collision.

And that's when Harry realized that while in mid jump, his stamina bar stopped falling. To Harry's amazement, even though he was traveling forward at the same speed as if he had continued running is stamina was starting to recharge while he was in midair.

Harry landed on his two feet, eyes wide as a thought struggled to come to him.

"What if I-" Harry's statement cut off as he stopped mid statement and looked back at the distance he had run, then forward down the path again. And then a smile spread across his face.

Harry took two sprinting steps forward, and then jumped.

And then he jumped again the moment he landed.

Then again, and again, and again.

"Bwa Ha ha! Boing! Boing! Boing!" Harry yelled out, including adding his own 'boing' sounds, as he rapidly traversed the length of his block at the speed of a dead sprint but while bouncing like a bunny rabbit that had just been given electroshock therapy. Even better his stamina bar only dipped a small amount with each jump but then the stamina meter recharged the part it had lost from doing the jump while Harry was in mid-air and not touching the ground.

"Ha ha ha! Take that game!" Harry yelled mid jump as he passed several of Petunia's book club members heading down the sidewalk towards number 4.

The three women just looked at each other, and then shook their heads as the obviously deranged boy bounced past them.

"The Dursley's must be saints to put up with that boy's unnaturalness." One of the women quipped with a haughty expression. All the others could do was nod and agree about the latest gossip topic to hit the neighborhood.

* * *

Harry bounced rapidly down the street and was coming up fast on the corner at the end of the Dursleys block. Right in Harry's path was a silver colored mission that he had seen on the map titled, "A Heroes First Save."

People stood around the corner, waiting for the bus or waiting to cross the slightly busier four lane street that stood between the neighborhood streets and the local school.

In midair, and about six feet from the curb, Harry's foot clipped the top of the grey exclamation point.

"Beep! Mission: A Heroes First Save. Mission parameters, Save the Baby, Don't Die, and you will earn 500 experience and increased standing with the muggles."

"My Baby!" A mother on the opposite side of the street from Harry screamed as she was bumped while she waited for the bus; her stroller with her baby inside slipped into the middle of the street and was barely missed by a speeding car as the stroller moved deeper into the traffic.

Harry didn't even think, he just jumped right out into the street.

Harry barely missed getting clipped by a speeding cab and jumped into the second lane of traffic and then quickly jumped to his left twice so as to gain room from the quickly oncoming lorry.

A quick jump forward like a frog trying not to get squashed saw him dodge the lorry, then dodge to the right three times, grab the baby out of the stroller and then two quick jumps forward to safety and the waiting arms of the mother.

Harry ignored the trophy emblem that popped up in his vision, as he had no idea what it was talking about when saying something about Frogger.

"Trophy! Let's Play Frogger! Congratulations on surviving a real life version of Frogger."

Instead of spending his time reading the trophy description, Harry was too busy getting pats on the back and a large hug from the woman whose baby he had saved.

"Ding! Gained 500 Experience points. Congratulations, the muggles like you more. Your muggle standing is now "That-Boy-The-Neighborhood-Isn't-Too-Sure-Of."

Harry growled mentally, '_Great, my very first hyphenated name.' _Still, Harry couldn't stay mad about his new standing for long as the muggles around him congratulated him on a job well done.

"Good job son, good job." One of the men on the corner stated, shaking Harry's hand vigorously.

"No problem, Sir. All in a day's work." Harry finished with a smile as the mother gave Harry a hug once again while simultaneously fussing over her baby.

Harry just smiled, excused himself, and then jumped off into the sunset- or at least down the block to seek further adventure in the neighborhood.

* * *

Speaking about the neighborhood, what felt like three hours of bunny hopping to Harry apparently was no time lapsed at all as the sun was still sitting stationary overhead. Despite the lack of time passing in the world around him, Harry Potter had still traversed every single one of the streets and sidewalks for the fronts of the houses in and surrounding the Dursley's neighborhood.

Three hours and counting, and Harry was still busy bouncing like a hyperactive kangaroo that had been hitting the cocaine just a little too much.

"Yee-Ha!" Harry yelled out, as at this point his jumps were quite high and long and they enabled him to almost feel like flying as he traversed the streets at the speed of a sprinter.

Three hours spent traveling at a speed of roughly twenty kilometers an hour (just over 12 miles per hour) had equaled fifty nine kilometers traveled, twelve levels of stamina gained, and an additional +2 points to Harry's strength ability.

Harry had traversed all of the streets, so now it was time to start checking out the grey areas that were the back yards of the neighborhood.

Harry took a hard right turn towards a hedge, using the ability to change directions nearly on a dime which he had discovered accidentally when dodging the speeding cars during the baby saving mission.

"Boing! WHEEEEE!" Harry yelled out, including yelling his own 'boing' sound, as he vaulted the hedge.

Only to plummet into the full Koi pond, of Japanese design, in the unnamed neighbor's back yard.

"Aah!" Harry's yell of joy came to an abrupt end as he missed the landing on a rock in the middle of the pond and landed face first in the algae filled water.

Flailing arms and legs thrashed the pond into a froth as Harry attempted not to drown- only to feel quite sheepish as he realized the pond was only a foot deep.

"Ptttoi! Blah! Yuck, blech!" Harry sat up, spitting the fishy tasting water out of his mouth before suddenly realizing that something wet and slimy was slithering against skin inside his shirt and had just touched his left nipple.

For a brief moment, memories of the giant squid in Hogwart's lake came to Harry's mind, coupled that with lessons from his muggle school teachers about "bad touching" and Harry was suddenly screaming again as he leapt out of the water.

"Eek!" Harry's pre-pubescent voice added to his ability to scream like a school girl as he Harry jumped out of the water, once again flailing and dancing around in his sodden state as he tried to get the slimy creature out of his shirt.

"Ding! Congratulations, you've caught a fish!" A message popped in front of Harry's vision the moment the large goldfish like Koi finally flopped out the bottom of Harry's shirt and into his hands.

Harry looked at the fish. He then looked at the pond, then back at the fish and felt rather sheepish about his earlier reaction. Still, waste not want not, so with a shrug Harry called out, "Inventory," and shoved the fish into an inventory slot before closing the inventory trunk. After all, you never knew when a fish might come in handy, and Harry was of the mindset to collect anything he could get his hands on.

Wringing out his sopping wet oversized clothing, Harry looked around the backyard he had bounced into; hedges bordered the yard giving it a sense of seclusion from the other backyards.

Though empty of anybody besides Harry, and the fish of course, the backyard of the house he found himself in was far from empty of decoration.

A finely raked white sand path with rocks led its way through the backyard; twisting its way until it reached a dark wood gazebo that was shaped something like the pillars of a Japanese temple, and it had red clay tiles on its roof.

Despite how interesting the decorations were, it was what was fluttering just above the gazebo that caught Harry's eye; it was a golden snitch.

Harry smiled, his eyes glued to the snitch as he soddenly tromped through the immaculate white sand path, leaving footprints behind him and the white sand sticking to his wet oversized and dragging pant legs and overly large beat-up sneakers.

Reaching the gazebo, Harry looked for a way to reach the top of the structure, and saw a glass outdoor dining table and chairs that looked somewhat promising.

Tugging on the table, which moved relatively easily given Harry's now +3 Strength stat, Harry aligned the table with the edge of the gazebo and then carefully climbed up onto the glass table. Fortunately for Harry, his light weight allowed him to safely stand on the table without cracking the glass.

Unfortunately for Harry, his short stature required him to jump up to grab the edge of the gazebo to pull himself up.

Harry grunted in effort as he grasped the lip of the gazebo's roof and heaved himself up and onto the slanted clay tiled roof. "Ugh, good thing I gained those two levels of strength." He groused to himself as he finally skittered his feet up onto the roof's ledge.

A faint buzzing sound of rapidly beating wings caught his attention, fluttering within jumping range at the apex of where the four slopes of the gazebo's roof came to a point.

Biting his tongue in concentration as his sandy wet sneakers slipped a bit on the roof, Harry carefully made his way to the apex of the roof, squatted down, and then jumped upwards are hard as he could to grab the fluttering golden snitch.

The fluttering snitch did what snitches do when a seeker is attempting to grab them, it dodged.

Still, Harry wasn't the youngest seeker ever for nothing, and he was known for doing whatever it took to catch the snitch.

The snitch moved to the right.

Harry threw his body to the right and grabbed the snitch.

That's when the immutable real world and game mechanics of gravity came into play, and Harry realized that he was in the air over the side of the gazebo, and now above the glass table that had helped him climb onto the roof.

"AAAAAAAAGH!" Crash!

"Ding! Congratulations, you've caught a Golden Snitch! Total snitches caught, 1/200" flashed before Harry's eyes as two of his previously red hearts were now flashing grey at him.

Somehow Harry didn't feel so thrilled about his first snitch catch, seeing as how he was lying in a pile of glass on the hard floor of the gazebo. In fact, his thoughts on the matter could be summed up nicely in one word.

"Ow." Harry groaned.

* * *

A dusting off of glass and sand, a few pieces of burnt toast eaten, and Harry was back to his bouncing self as he finished exploring the backyards on that block and cleared the last hedge before the street with a bounding leap.

"Trophy! You're a Jumping Fool! Congratulations on jumping over 5000 times."

A message popped up in the corner of Harry's vision, causing Harry to shake his head in exasperation. Several of these supposed badges or achievements had been popping up through his travels, and Harry thought of them as just ways that the creator of the game was poking fun at him. How else was he supposed to take it when his other recent trophies were called "You can tie your shoes!" and "Mind the Gap;" trophies Harry had achieved for stopping to tie his shoelaces and then for tripping on a street curb as he missed a jump.

Harry just shook his head, as why would anybody care how many times he had jumped or that he had once tripped over a curb? Whoever had created this game obviously had a twisted sense of humor.

"You're still a bastard." Harry groused at the unseen watchers under his breath as he stopped and looked around himself.

There across from Harry was the neighborhood park. Several swing sets were in place above a large sandbox that included monkey-bars, a slide and a spinning wheel thing that kids could ride on. Trees dotted the park in clumps or singly. It was the tree directly across the street from Harry that caught his attention, or more specifically, the silver exclamation point floating over a slightly glowing long branch of wood that seemed to have fallen off of the tree.

Harry shrugged, looked both ways, and jumped his way across the street.

In the shade of a large walnut tree the silver exclamation point hung in the air over the long stick that was mostly straight and had broken off with a decidedly pointy end on one side.

Harry looked around, "Why not?" He said out loud to nobody in particular, and picked up the stick.

"Beep!" "Mission: He Wielded A Pointy Stick." "Mission parameters: for 100 experience points and 1 Pointy Stick, beat the Rabid Squirrel in combat." The message flashed before Harry's eyes.

Harry's eyes went large. "Wait a second, Rabid Squirrel?!"

"Chit chit chit chit, reeee!" A sound over Harry's shoulder had him looking up into the tree, only to come face to face with a squirrel that was foaming at the mouth and in mid leap at Harry.

"AHHH! Rabid Squirrel!" Harry screamed and flung the pointy end of his stick in the direction of the squirrel.

Fortunately the Potter luck was still strong with Harry, and Harry's maneuver was the equivalent of rolling a natural 20, or a critical strike as the squirrel shish-kobobed itself on the end of Harry's Pointy Stick.

"Ding! Rabid Squirrel Defeated! You earned 1 Pointy Stick and 100 Experience points."

Harry was too busy mumbling "Ew, ew, ew, yuck." And trying to fling the now dead squirrel off of his pointy stick. Finally the carcass went sailing off the end of Harry's new stick and away from Harry, and Harry daintily wiped the blood off his stick by sliding the point through the grass until it was clean.

In the end, Harry was left holding his Pointy Stick and no idea what to do with it. Fortunately enough that was just about the time that the tutorial popped up again.

"Ding! Armed, but not so dangerous. Congratulations on gaining your first weapon, primitive though it may be. Weapons can be stored in your inventory, in special holsters designed for those weapons, or carried by hand. In some environments carrying a weapon may get you in trouble, causing people to not want to talk to you or even get you arrested. In short, it's best not to carry your weapon out in polite company, and sometimes it's downright dangerous in the presence of impolite company. Every weapon type has a holster you either make or buy. Also, don't forget to search your kills for loot or consumables."

Harry looked from the tutorial bubble, down to the rabid squirrel carcass, and then vigorously shook his head.

"Oh hell no, I'm not searching that." Harry stated definitively.

With that, the tutorial disappeared, and Harry shrugged and stored the Pointy Stick in his Inventory.

It was then that Harry noticed other softly glowing items scattered around the large park. The park was one of the municipal parks for the town of Little Whinging, so was surprisingly large with its cricket field, football pitch, grassy areas, picnic benches, and playground.

Harry stooped down to a glowing patch of clover next to him and picked up a piece of it, only to be surprised when he got two pieces of clover in his hands. "You've collected a four leaf clover, You've collected a four leaf clover." Popped up in the corner of his eye.

"Ding! Collecting Stuff." A tutorial expanded in the middle of Harry's vision, "You can collect stuff that you may or may not be able to use later in potions or with other characters. Go ahead, try to collect them all!"

Harry shrugged, "Never know when it might come in handy." Harry said under his breath, before starting to bounce across the park collecting items.

"You've collected wild mint, You've collected wild mint, You've collected wild mint, You've collected…" Harry could see how the messages would eventually get annoying, but that still didn't stop him from canvasing the park for collectables. The collection of plants went on and on, including a bit of catnip, a whole lot of mint, a couple dandelions and a few wild daisies.

What felt like another three hours, Harry had over thirty four leaf clovers, twenty eight sprigs of catnip, dandelion greens and blossoms by the 100 stack, several variety of flowers including every rose from the park's rose garden, two playground buckets and a shovel, and fifteen buckets of sand that Harry didn't have a clue what to do with. Harry even hit the jackpot when he found a couple of One Pound coins lying underneath a park bench where parents normally sat to watch their children on the playground.

Harry smiled to himself when he was given notice that he now was the proud owner of 2 Pounds Muggle and 0 Galleons. Looking around the park, Harry couldn't see any more glowing items to collect, except for a small hand shovel that he must have missed earlier.

Upon picking up the small hand shovel, a chorus of trumpets sounded and a word bubble popped up in Harry's vision, just as the shovel grew in length to be a full dirt shovel longer than Harry was tall and painted in yellow and black spirals up the handle and checkered across the shovels head/blade.

"Tada! With hard labor and diligent work, you've earned the "Hufflepuff Harry" title and a new tool and weapon, the Hufflepuff Shovel. For when there is shit to be done, we know you'll be there diligently shoveling it!"

Harry looked rather nonplussed by his new weapon/tool. "Hardy har har, you're a regular laugh riot is what you are." Harry groused as he looked over his shovel.

"Inventory," Harry called, getting ready to put away his new weapon, only to find a new tab in his inventory called "Weapons."

Touching the tab, an expanded area of the chest opened up like closet or armory; though it was rather bare armory with only one Pointy Stick resting on a weapons rack. Still, the addition of the Weapons armory gave Harry some new information he hadn't had before as floating above the Pointy Stick on its rack was the weapons Statistics of: 1 melee attack/1 defense. As Harry set down the shovel in a weapon rack, its statistics floated above it: 3 melee attack/1 defense, Plus 2 to Herbology when wielding Hufflepuff Shovel and Plus 1 to attempts to Hide Bodies or turn them into fertilizer.

Harry paled at the last two details, "I'm never going to look badly at Hufflepuffs again." Harry stated definitively.

Closing his inventory and shaking off the shivers that came from imaging Madame Sprout and how she made her fertilizer, Harry looked around at all the collecting he had done and realized he was done with that for now.

"Well that wasn't so hard; I wonder what other types of missions are around here." Harry pivoted in his spot, and saw a lone golden mission exclamation point hanging in the air near the swing sets. So Harry smiled and jumped his way over to the swing set.

Touching the golden mission symbol as it hung in the air, Harry was given the details.

"Beep!" "Mission, Survive Harry Hunting Season," "Mission parameters, for 1000 experience points and +1 point to Dexterity, dodge Dudley and his gang and get to safety."

"Hey, there's the Freak! Get 'em" Dudley's voice sounded from Harry's right as Dudley, Piers Polkis and the rest of "Big D's" gang came out of a copse of trees, pointed at Harry and charged.

It was supposed to be an incredibly challenging mission for a level one Harry to survive, hence its main gold exclamation point status and high reward.

Harry in his previous life would have cringed and relied on his smaller size and dexterity to dodge through the playground equipment, or perhaps his ability to run and hide in small places. Heck, Harry from a few hours ago would have been beaten to a pulp by Dudley and his gang as soon as Harry ran out of stamina.

This, however, was Harry Potter exploiter of game glitches, proud achievement winner of the "Jumping Fool" trophy, and grinder of stamina levels 1 through 12 for a total ability of Strength +3.

Dudley and his gang didn't have a chance.

"Ha Ha! Run Run as fast as you can, you can't catch me, I'm the Jumping Fool Man! Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha!" Harry cackled in glee as he took two fast sprinting steps and then began to jump.

As Harry disappeared down the street, and Dudley and his gang fell further and further behind, all they could hear was the mad cackling of Harry Potter as he bounced out of sight.

And throughout the neighborhood, the people of Surrey just shook their head at the small strange bunny-hopping child who lived at number 4 Privet Drive.

* * *

**AN: Short, fun, hopefully as enjoyable as the previous chapter. Next chapter we will see Harry progressing the story, having a few more fun side missions, and learning some other game mechanics; hopefully with humorous outcomes. I don't know how much I'll write of this, I don't really have an end for it plotted out. Heck, I don't even have the first year plotted out. Then again, some of the best stories are just created as you go. That said, always up for ideas that can inspire me to write more, especially if you have good ideas on classic ways to exploit games, etc. I'm just glad Harry got the pointed stick, I so wanted him to use that on Draco Malfoy at some point. I can see it now, "Draco Malfoy enters the Hogwarts express carriage and begins to mock Harry, Harry Potter uses Pointed Stick! "AH, My spleen!" Draco Screams." Because we all know that it's fun and games until somebody gets a pointy stick in the spleen. Anyway, let me know your thoughts. Cheers!**


	3. Chapter 3: Angry Mr Tibbles

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or the characters of his universe, I just play in that sandbox for fun and without pay or any form of remuneration other than reviews and private messages; which are fortunately non-taxable.

**AN: I have to say that the response I've received on this story has helped to inspire me to find my previously lost love of writing. Over 270 reviews?! Are you kidding me? Wow. I'm not sure what I enjoy more, coming up with crazy ideas and funny quirky plotlines or seeing the reaction of the readers. All I have to say is thank you so much for the flood of great ideas and reviews, when I see you chuckling or laughing in your reviews it makes me smile in return. Ok, now for a couple of items regarding the last two chapters: 1. I fixed the errors with the 250 versus 500 experience that Harry should have received for saving the baby, and I fixed the pound coins. Humorously enough on the pound coins, I was chastised in a review for my Oops story about using pound coins in Britain during 1939. Apparently there were one pound notes back then but not the coins; probably due to the scarcity of metal during the great wars and growing inflation over the years. 2. The Harry in this story knows he is in a video game, he understands roughly what a video game is seeing as how Dudley no doubt had some, and the idea of a game spans both the wizarding world and muggle world. That said Harry has no experience specifically exploiting video games or really even playing them. He is also a slave to his stats, so without a high intelligence and wisdom score he isn't going to be able to perfect the exploits beyond the common sense things that he learns through trial and error and just dogged determination to survive and win. He's devious, but he isn't smart like Hermione… yet. Cheers!**

* * *

'_Thoughts are in italics'_

"Things Said, or Things Written"

Chapter 3: Angry Mr. Tibbles

"Ding! Mission complete! +1 to Dexterity and 1000 XP. Level UP!"

Flashed in front of Harry's eyes the moment Dudley and his gang disappeared behind Harry and his mad sprint speed bunny hopping. Even though Harry was in the process of jumping, the world around him froze, including Harry who hung in midair as a new window popped up along with a tutorial explaining what was happening.

"I Wish I Was A Little Bit Taller, I Wish I Was A Baller" The tutorial was titled before explaining what was in front of Harry. "Welcome to the Level Up menu, where you can tailor your character for your type of play. As you gain experience in the game you will level up when you reach the required amount of experience to meet the next level. You gain experience by defeating enemies, completing missions, or finding secrets or treasure. For every level you gain, you can add four points to your ability stats; though that can be modified given perks, powers or bonuses you earn in the game. At age 4 and in the first level of the game, your stats to date are thus:"

At which point the tutorial message moved to the top right of Harry's vision, and his statistics and current scores were shown to him in the Level Up menu.

**Level 2:**

**CURRENT EXP: **1625 **TOTAL EXP NEEDED FOR NEXT LEVEL: **2100

**Health: 11/11**

**Magic: N/A**

**Ability points to be allocated: 4**

**ABILITIES: **

Strength: 3

Dexterity: 4

Constitution: 1

Intelligence: 3

Wisdom: 2

Charisma: 1

**SKILLS:**

Herbology: 0

**CRAFTING:**

Cooking: Master Chef

Harry examined the possibilities, but didn't know what to necessarily put points in. Thankfully the programmer of the game was good for something, and that something was the tutorial messages; even if they did tend to poke fun at Harry.

"Level Up noob, where to put your points." The tutorial read, and even though Harry didn't know what the term "noob" meant, he decided to flip his fingers towards the sky preemptively as he was pretty sure he was being mocked again.

"With every level your health, magic and stamina will grow, however what abilities increase is up to you. Place your points carefully in your abilities as you won't be able to move them.

Strength allows you to carry heavy things, use large weapons, perform more athletic tasks like jump further, or run swim or climb faster, and increases your melee damage.

Dexterity allows you to hit what you aim at and dodge others that are trying to hit you. Who attacks first is determined by your Dexterity as well as assists you in tasks that require fast thinking and deft actions like picking locks, sneaking, picking pockets, finding traps without triggering them, and most of all not getting caught when you don't want to be.

Constitution is your life as well as your ability to shrug off attacks of the body, mind, and soul. Every point to Constitution assists you in resisting poison, attacks to your mind, or attacks on your soul, and every two points in Constitution gives you another Heart to your total health.

Intelligence is your smarts and enables you to learn things faster, calculate situations and problems easier, and increases the number of skill points you get per each level. For every 2 points of intelligence you gain, you get 1 additional skill point per level up.

Wisdom is all about the magic. As a child of 4, with unbound magic, you have a surprisingly high Wisdom of 2 whereas the average unbound magical four year old would only have a Wisdom of 0. For every point you put into Wisdom your pool of magic increases by 20 units. That's 20 units that lets you cast more spells or overpower the spells you have already learned.

Charisma is how well respected by, and how good you are with, the ladies, the public at large, merchants, government officials and the different races and species of the Harry Potter Adventure world. At a Charisma of 1 you are a generally untrusted by the masses, a mopey bastard prone to brooding, your first real kiss will make a girl cry and the world at large will turn on you in the wink of an eye. With a Charisma of 25 or above, people think you are a swell guy, women flirt with you, you get the smile of the year award, and gosh darn-it people like you. At 50, women want you, men want to be you, and make sure you duck when they throw their underwear at you."

Harry read the last details about Charisma and had to bite his tongue not to go into an expletive laced tirade at the game's seeming mocking him and his previously painful life.

"Would have been nice to have known this last time." Harry growled, only to have a new tutorial message pop up.

"In Hard mode, tutorial messages are not possible and your ability and skill points are automatically allocated based on the abilities and skills you regularly use. Aren't you glad you are in Normal mode? Have a nice day!"

"Merlin's enlarged prostate! You bastards!" Harry yelled in anger. It was official, the game was definitely mocking him.

Harry pouted for a few moments, steamed at the situation he found himself in. But as the Abilities screen stayed waiting for him to act he finally decided to place his points.

Still fuming a bit, Harry spoke to himself as he examined his options, "Hmm, definitely like the idea of extra skill points every level, even if I only have Herbology available to me at the moment. And figuring out these ways around the game mechanics would be easier if I was smarter- still, I want to be a power house when I finally reach Hogwarts, and being better able to throw off the imperius or legilimency and give me another heart would be nice."

Harry bit his lip in concentration for a few moments before nodding and placing his points. "One point to Intelligence, one to Constitution, and two to Wisdom." Harry ordered.

**Health: 12/12**

**Magic: N/A**

**Ability points to be allocated: 0**

**ABILITIES: **

Strength: 3

Dexterity: 4

Constitution: 2

Intelligence: 4

Wisdom: 4

Charisma: 1

His stats locked in as he used his available Ability points.

"Skills for the skill-less, there is hope for you yet-maybe." The tutorial message read as the abilities screen disappeared and suddenly a list of Skills was shown, most of them greyed out and others labeled "Unknown."

Currently the only skill that was lit up was "Herbology" which showed a skill level of 0, but Harry knew he could modify that to 2 if he was wielding the Hufflepuff Shovel; the idea still made him shiver a bit when he thought of Madame Sprout and her fertilizer piles behind the Hogwart greenhouses.

"Skills can be increased in several different ways. Leveling up provides you with a total of 4 skill points each level, plus an additional skill point for every 2 points of Intelligence you have. Some perks, which we will discuss in the next section, also provide additional bonuses or negatives to your skill levels. Weapons, armor, enchantments, potions and spells may also affect your skill level; though are often temporary or last only so long as the item lasts or is equipped. The best thing for raising skill levels are constant use, missions, and skill books; skill books can be found throughout the world. Skill points may be immediately spent upon leveling up or saved for future use."

As he read the tutorial, a thought popped into his head. Well, two thoughts popped into his head, the first was that he was really glad he had raised his intelligence level as the second thought had been floating just out there on the edge of his consciousness as he read the tutorial message on skills. Just to be sure, Harry Potter read the tutorial once again, and then a third time.

"Bwa ha ha ha ha." Harry chuckled darkly. "Screw with me, I screw with you." Harry cackled as he rubbed his hands together in glee.

"Pass on the skill menu, I'll keep my 6 skill points for now and put them in something magical or combat related later." Harry ordered, the wicked smirk still on his face as the screen flipped to perks and Harry saw that he had the option to allocate one perk point and about five perks available to him to choose from.

**Available Perks: 1 Perk Point available**

"**Hair Like Snape" **

"**Lemon-Drop Addiction"**

"**A Black Gene"**

"**A Summer Job"**

"**Comprehending The Incomprehensible."**

None of the perks explained what they did until Harry mentioned their name. Hesitant though he was, he started at the top.

"Hair like snape." Harry questioned, his statement coming out as more as a cringing tentative question than an order.

"Hair Like Snape" a pop-up box read. "Your hair is as greasy, stringy and black as if you grew it out only to bathe it in motor oil on an hourly basis. You gain 10 permanent points to your Potions skill and a 25% chance of critical successes on Potion crafting; critically successful potions magnify the abilities of the potion by 50%. On the other hand, no amount of washing, enchantments, charms or potions will ever get rid of the grease in your hair, you will suffer a permanent -1 to Charisma and this will open up a conversation line where people ask you if a certain potions professor is actually your father. Would you like to purchase this perk? Yes, or No?"

"HELL NO!" Harry screamed, as he had been getting progressively more and more pale as he had read the description for the perk. Even the mere thought of being related to Snape almost made him physically sick. He just hoped that the next perk option was nicer to him.

"Lemon-drop addiction." The tutorial read as Harry said its name. "For most muggles and wizards the Lemon-drop candy is merely a slightly bitter and sweet confection. For some however, with a decidedly addictive personality coupled with a rare gene, the lemon-drop is the key to tapping magical power in its most potent form. The character who chooses the Lemon-drop addiction gets an additional bonus to their magical power by 33%, but is forced to eat lemon-drops several times a day or risk going into withdrawal. Lemon-drop withdrawal not only removes your bonus of 33% more magic, but also reduces your magic available by an additional 50%. Would you like to purchase this perk? Yes, or No?"

Harry again said no while shaking his head as his new level of intelligence gave him an insight into something that he never understood before. "That explains so much about Dumbledore. Still, I never realized that his offering of lemon-drops to everybody who entered his office was his way of pushing an addictive substance." Harry shrugged as he got ready to look at the third perk, "Oh well, it's just an addict trying to share his addiction, he probably figures the extra 33% bonus to magic is for the Greater Good."

The next perk popped up upon Harry's command. "A Black Gene, your grandmother was born a Black from the House of Black, and you've been born with the Black Gene. This gene type gives you an additional +10 to the Dark Magic skill and enables you to metamorph your hair color and length twice a day. Gaining this gene will immediately put you into conflict with Bellatrix Lestrange and the Malfoy family, both of which feel increased antagonism to you due to your blood status and the fact that you are next in line for the position of Head of House Black."

"Nah, not interested." Harry finished, preempting the question on if he wanted the perk.

"A Summer Job. At the end of every summer you gain an additional one hundred pounds muggle money and go back to school with tan and calluses. Yes it is child labor, but at least you're paid for it."

"Not interested, Next!" Harry ordered, hoping this next perk was worth the while, because he really didn't want to select the first two options, and the last two were just ok.

"Comprehending The Incomprehensible, you like to read and you are good at it. Maybe it's magic, or maybe it's just the weird way your brain works, but you gain an additional +2 skill points for every skill book you read and an additional +1 ability point for every ability bonus book you read. Still, you have to find the books first. Would you like to purchase this perk? Yes, or No?"

Harry smirked, this perk just added to his to his already wicked thought that came from reading the skill tutorial.

"Yes, I want the Comprehending The Incomprehensible perk." Harry ordered, and with that the perk lit up and his perk point disappeared and the Level Up screen also disappeared.

The world around Harry came back into motion, and Harry landed out of his jump on two feet; cushioning his landing by bending his knees.

"Inventory," Harry commanded, a huge smile spreading across his face. Harry retrieved his Pointy Stick from his armory and then pointed it down the block and back towards where the public elementary school was which also housed the Little Whinging Public Library.

"To the Library, Charge!" Harry yelled while thrusting his Pointy Stick in the air and bunny hopping his way towards the library.

* * *

"Skill books, skill books everywhere, bwa ha ha ha ha." Harry cackled. It hadn't been terribly hard to mingle with the children on the playground as the recess ended and Harry followed them into the school. Harry had to restrain himself from jumping through the hallways as at 4 years old he wasn't exactly supposed to be there, and he probably risked getting thrown out if he was caught. Still, even though the interior of the school was greyed out and unexplored, Harry knew the way to the library as in his previous life this school had been where he and Dudley attended class.

Moving through the taller students, because come on, Harry was short even for his age, Harry turned the corner and entered the equivalent of the game grinder's holy land, the library.

Harry had to bite his fist to keep himself from cackling, as throughout the library Harry saw here and there glowing books, yet still the "Be Quiet" signs lined the walls and even hung from placards attached to strings dangling from the ceiling.

The moment Harry stepped into the library, the Auto-save signal lit up in his vision, making him startle as he realized he had forgotten to save while doing all of his exploring. Soon the Auto-save disappeared, and Harry was able to focus on the shelves of books.

It wasn't like every book on the shelves was a skill book, but still, there were at least twenty skill books available on the shelves and behind the librarian's desk were two locked cases that held five glowing ability books; each of those books labeled with one of the ability stats names on them.

Rather than go for the hard goal first, especially since Harry didn't have a clue on how to get to the books locked in the cases, Harry went about trying to gather the twenty odd skill books and then carry the wobbling pile back to a table. Even with his strength skill of +3, the books were a strain and Harry found that he could only carry ten of the books at a time; plus given his small size, ten stacked books was enough to block his vision as these weren't kiddy books.

"Lock-picking +3" Harry smiled at the message as he opened a book titled simply "The Thief." Apparently he didn't even have to read the whole skill book, and the original +1 to the before then unknown skill also gained the +2 that his perk gave him.

Harry quickly set the book down and opened another skill book, followed by another after that.

"Duel Wielding +3" "Armor Wearing +3" "Unarmed +3" "Pick-pocket +3" "Pick-pocket +3" "Muggle subjects +3" "French language+3" ""Muggle subjects +3" "Muggle subjects +3" "Duel Wilding +3" "Lock-picking +3" "Muggle subjects +3." The messages popped up one after the other as Harry quickly opened a skill book, gained the points, then closed it and opened the next. However an interesting thing happened when Harry opened up the third "Muggle subjects" book; a book and skill set that seemed to cover all of the normal muggle school subjects like reading, writing, arithmetic, muggle history and the sciences.

"Ding, +1 to intelligence." A message flashed before Harry's eyes, interrupting the list of skill point additions and was quickly followed by a new tutorial message that interrupted Harry's skill book grinding.

"So you want to be a Ravenclaw?" "Congratulations on getting your first 10 points or more in Muggle Subjects. For every 10 points you gain in Muggle Subjects you can get a +1 to your Intelligence score. Similarly, studying Magical Subjects like Arithmancy, History of Magic, Magical theory, and Runes can gain you points to your Wisdom score; every 10 points in Magical Subjects gains you +1 Wisdom. You can gain points in Muggle Subjects or Magic Subjects by finding skill books or by studying applicable books yourself. Skill books are instant gains in skill points, studying yourself requires that you actually read and study the subject. Have fun- nerd."

Harry didn't even mind that the tutorial had just insulted him, once again, he had books to read.

* * *

Seven additional skill books later, one of them being another Duel-Wielding book and the other six Muggle Subjects, Harry was up another 18 points of Muggle Subjects and had gained another 2 points to Intelligence. He was feeling brilliant.

"I am a Genius!" Harry yelled out in joy, jumping out of his chair and pumping his fists in success.

At which point Harry Potter learned the difference between Intelligence and Charisma, for though the people of Little Whinging had upgraded his status to "That-Boy-The-Neighborhood-Isn't-Too-Sure-Of," Harry's School District status was "Hostile-You-Hooligan!" Coupled with his lowly Charisma of 1, which according to the tutorial made people turn on him in a wink of an eye and upon yelling in the library, Harry found himself mobbed by 4 white haired Old Lady Librarians.

"Ambush!"

"Old Lady Librarian attacks with "BE QUIET!" You take 4 points of Shhhh! Damage!" "Head Old Lady Librarian attacks with "BE QUIET!" Critical hit! You take 6 points of Shhhh! Damage" "Old Lady Librarian attacks: uses Boxes Ears, you take 1 point of Damage and are Dazed." "Old Lady Librarian attacks with "Revokes Library Privileges" Uses dazed status and low health to toss you out of library and school. Special attack add-on effect! The Power of a Good Book Compels You: Lose track of 2 hours."

The attacks happened before Harry could even arm his Pointy Stick, such was the power of the Old Lady Librarians in their native habitat.

And thus Harry Potter found himself laying on his back outside of the Little Whinging Elementary School, staring up dazed into the sun as one lone red heart flashed at him in warning.

* * *

"Trophy! Congratulations, you've won the trophy "Beat Down By A Blue-Haired Biddy." You've been beaten up by an old woman, aren't you proud?"

The trophy taunted Harry, but he was too dazed to notice it as he lay on the ground unblinking up at the sunny English sky.

Finally Harry blinked as his Dazed status wore off, and was a bit stunned as the sun moved from its 9:00 AM position to 11:00 AM; a clock on his visuals telling him the change in time.

Stumbling to his feet, his ears ringing from the boxing as well as the loud "Shhh!" attacks, Harry weaved in a stupor while calling out "Inventory."

Fortunately he had Burnt Bacon to the rescue, as bacon is known for curing a multitude of ills.

Finally after a few minutes and a full health bar of 12 hearts, Harry shook himself and then dusted himself off and attempted to re-enter the elementary school.

It was locked.

"Crappit!" Harry cursed before bending down and looking at the lock.

"Dee-Do," "So You Feeling Lucky, Punk." The tutorial popped up showing a difficulty marking above the lock that said, "Medium" and a close-up view of the lock and almost an x-ray view of the interior which showed its pins and locking mechanism.

"To pick a lock you need a hair-pin, lock-pick set, or know an unlocking spell. The lock-pick skill governs all unlocking abilities, including the magical. As your lock-picking skill gets better, you are better able to unlock harder locks without failing, setting off alarms, or breaking your hair-pins or lock-picks. Currently you own: 0 hair-pins, 0 lock-pick sets, and 0 unlocking spells. You can also attempt to break doors and bust open locks with physical force if you have the requisite strength, weapon, or spell. You currently have none of the above. Have a nice day!"

Harry cursed and stomped away from the door. "There went my bloody chance to read every book in the library, especially those ability books." Harry groused. Then, as if to add insult to injury, his new intelligence level of 7 provided him with the insight that not only could he not read and study the books in the library, he had no idea what other types of items or skill grinding he could have found available in the other parts of the school.

"BAH!" Harry yelled in anger, for apparently smarts aren't everything.

* * *

Harry was bouncing down the street towards the Dursleys, coming from the direction towards Ms. Figg's house, when he saw two young teenagers in leather jackets poking at a burlap sack that was shaking with loud hissing and cat's meows. An exclamation point hovering over the laughing teens' heads told Harry that this was the mission "The Kneazles In The Bag."

The two teens didn't know what hit them.

Falling upon them like a Bouncing Kindergartner of Doom, four year old Harry Potter used his new 9 points of Duel-Wielding to bring down the hammer… or at least the Hufflepuff Shovel and Pointy Stick.

"You gain initiative! Surprise attack!"

"Kong!" Harry's Hufflepuff Shovel made a ringing sound as the flat black and yellow checkered metal head of the shovel knocked the teen holding the bag right upside the teen's head. A green bar appeared above the teen's head and immediately dropped into the red, showing the boy's health drop to 2/10 points due to the power of Harry's special weapon; it would also be good for hiding the bodies later.

Meanwhile, using his Pointy Stick like a lance, Harry channeled his rage at getting beaten up by old lady librarians to stab the second boy.

"Critical Hit! Spleen Skewer!" Rang over the second teen's head. The blow immediately dropped the second teenager to 1 health, take bleeding damage that would kill the teen if not healed, and caused the teen to drop to the ground and start screaming, "My Spleen! You stabbed me in the spleen! Why God? Why?"

Due to Harry's attack initiative given his unusually high Dexterity of 4 and lucky surprise attack bonus of a Bouncing Attack From Above, Harry was able to swing his shovel again, braining the first boy and dropping him to 0 health.

In another lifetime, a 4 year old Harry would have been no match for the two boys. In another lifetime where a malnourished 4 year old Harry Potter hadn't ground skills, bunny hopped for hours to increase his stamina and strength stats, and would have only had a Pointy Stick. Well, that Harry would never have had the option of a surprise attack, and that Harry would have gotten his ass kicked and would be learning about how to reload at the last saved game.

This Harry, working off of a Surprise attack and getting to attack twice in a row quickly finished off the two young teenagers.

"Tada! You've defeated Level 2 Weak Teen Hooligans, 250 Experience earned. Loot bodies? Yes, No?"

Flashed above the two lifeless bodies.

It was at this point that Harry realized he had just killed two humans, in broad daylight, in the middle of a heavily populated neighborhood.

"Aaaah! What have I done?! Aaaah! What am I going to do?!" Harry danced in place, jumping up and down as he freaked out, looking around as he expected a police cruiser to pull up at any moment to arrest him. He expected answering screams to issue from the ever gossipy and snooping neighbors, and expected no lack of witnesses to his double homicide.

Harry quickly looked to his left up the street, ready to run.

Seeing nothing to his left, Harry darted a look to his right down that direction of the street.

Yet no cops appeared.

No neighbors entered the street to yell recriminations.

Nobody seemed to care. In fact, a mail man walking the other side of the street was whistling as he worked. The mail man even looked at Harry and smiled with a little wave before going back to delivering the post.

"What the hell?" Harry asked, totally off kilter about the lack of reaction to the two dead teens lying at his feet.

"Loot bodies? Yes, No?" Popped up in his vision again as a reminder.

Harry took a big breath in. Held it. Then forced himself to relax with a deep exhale.

"Ok, so video game Harry is allowed to kill people and not get in trouble- hmmm, this could lead to some nice opportunities." Harry finished, a small smile creeping across his face as he thought about getting rid of Snape, Malfoy senior, or even some of the members of what Harry was mentally labeling "The League of Incompetent Junior Death Eaters," or T.L.I.J.D.E. for short; an acronym that made about as much sense as any other acronym used in the wizarding world.

"Loot bodies? Yes, No?" Popped up again, apparently not going to leave Harry alone until he answered.

"Fine, fine, don't get your bloomers in a bunch." Harry rolled his eyes at the annoying message pop-ups, "Yes, I want to loot."

In an instant, Harry was getting an eye full of two sets of pasty white male butt cheeks as the two Weak Teenaged Hooligans were suddenly naked lying face down in front of Harry.

"Argh! My Eyes!" Harry flinched back and looked away. Fortunately the image of the loot he gained stayed floating in his vision even as he looked in a 'safe' direction.

"You gain 1 leather jacket, 1 switchblade, 1 pair of fitted jeans, 10 pounds muggle money."

"Wonderful Loot, or in short, Woot!" Harry thought he was being witty as he made a new word.

"Inventory." Harry commanded, and when the trunk popped into existence Harry saw a new tab called Armor had been added next to the Weapons tab.

Upon clicking on the Armor tab, Harry saw the new jeans and leather jacket were available, but what was most interesting was a life sized image of Harry wearing his baggy worn out Dursley hand-me-downs in a three dimensional image in the right hand side of the inventory chest.

Harry furrowed his brow, and the 3D image also scrunched up its forehead.

Harry waved, and the image waved back. Harry smiled, and the image smiled back.

"Wicked." Harry quipped before looking at the options displayed in the Armor tab and saw a button that said "Default," another button that said "Max Defense," and then the statistics for Harry's current wear versus the Leather Jacket and Jeans he had just looted.

"Current armor rating, -2" Harry read his total armor rating with the Dursley Hand-Me-Downs and was not amused. Apparently the Armor Wearing skill bonus to his armor rating was only 1 point. Unfortunately though the -3 from the baggy shirt, baggy worn out jeans and worn-out hand-me-downs sneakers erased any benefit he was gaining from his armor skill and then some.

"Bah, Default." Harry groused, just wanting to get rid of the Dursleys clothes to see what his normal armor rating was- but not thinking about what the system meant by Default.

Upon Harry's command, Harry was suddenly looking at a naked 3D image of four year old Harry Potter.

That's when Harry felt a draft and looked down.

"Eep! Max Defense! Max Defense!" Harry quickly crossed his hands over his privates and crossed his legs as he noticed his adolescent twig and berries and the rest of his naked body were on display for the entire neighborhood to see. The program wasn't even nice enough to give him a pixelated blur of his private bits, nor give him a simple loin cloth or underwear.

Fortunately the Max Defense command had Harry wearing the Leather Jacket and Jeans before he could win the "Going for a Streak" trophy. His new ware now included the nice slightly armored leather jacket and jeans along with his original Hand-Me-Down shirt and worn out sneakers.

Harry smiled and turned to the left, then turned to the right, the image in the trunk showing off the fact that Harry finally had a pair of pants that fit and that coupled with the Leather jacket raised Harry's Armor rating to +2; which would have been higher if he wasn't still wearing the Durlsey provided baggy shirt and shoes which were giving him negative armor penalties.

Still, the new clothes made Harry happy, so now it was time to look at his new weapon.

"Switchblade, 5 melee attack/0 Defense. Special attack when Duel-Wielding two Switchblades, The-Sewing-Machine: You wield your blades at a tremendous speed, stitching a line of punctures down your enemy's frame."

"Wicked." Harry mused before unequipping his trusty Pointy Stick and equipping the Switchblade along with the Hufflepuff shovel.

"Meow! Hiss." Issued from the burlap sack on the ground, drawing Harry's attention and reminding Harry about the whole point of the mission.

Looking at the sack, a popup appeared over the sack. "Release kneazle and complete mission? Y, N?"

"Wait, why wouldn't I want to complete the mission—" Harry's statement cut off as a thought germinated in his mind.

Harry looked at the bag that included the squirming cat and Harry cocked his head to the side, "On one hand, I hate seeing the kitten being tortured, but on the other—well, it would sure be nice to try and get another switchblade and complete my set of new clothes." Harry paused for a second, and then shrugged.

"Sorry kitty, greed beats need." Harry quipped and then answered, "No, fail mission."

"Mission Failed," The screen announced, and Harry blinked.

In the instance that he blinked, the cat was once again held in a bag by two snickering Level 2 Weak Teenaged Hooligans with a floating mission exclamation point floating above their head.

"Bwa ha ha ha ha, let the gravy train commence operations." Harry smiled evilly.

"Save game." Harry ordered, his new intelligence of 7 helping him to remember the rather simplistic idea of saving before entering combat.

"Game Saved." The system stated as a little image of a thumbs-up with the words next to it popped up in the corner of Harry's vision.

Harry stepped forward towards the two teens with an evil smile on his face, just as both teens turned to Harry and sneered at him.

"What you want tosser?" One of the teens stated, while the one not holding the bag took a threatening step towards Harry and added his two pence, "Get lost ankle biter."

Harry just smiled up at them in return and pulled out his Hufflepuff Shovel and Switchblade.

"Let's play." Harry quipped, and combat began.

* * *

Harry got his ass kicked.

More specifically, Harry was quickly killed and found himself at the menu screen asking if he wanted to continue at the last save.

With a growl, Harry reloaded the game.

And then Harry died again.

In fact, Harry was killed and had to reload three times, he ran away once, and then had to restart the mission after a fifth accidental failure before he lucked out with another winning Initiative and gaining a Surprise attack and the related two attacks in a row that allowed him to narrowly kill the two teenagers.

In the first three rounds both hooligans, armed with switchblades, each did 5 damage to Harry every attack even with his new jacket and jeans; absolutely destroying Harry's health bar. First round of combat saw Harry dropped to only 2 remaining hearts, and his return attacks only did a total of 11 damage spread between the two teens before they killed him in the next round.

Harry died three times before running away the forth and eating food to regain his health and attempt a fifth time to grind the combat.

The fifth time he tried the mission saw Harry's relatively low dexterity causing his shovel to miss in its swing at one of the Hooligans and instead bash the bag holding the cat, killing the kneazle and causing the mission to fail. He might have been deft for a 4 year old, but he was far from having perfect aim with his attacks with a Dexterity of 4.

It wasn't until the fifth attempt at the mission "The Kneazles In The Bag" that saw Harry win due to another surprise attack which included another critical strike called "Shiv to the Spleen." Harry had shook his head at the programmer's obsession with the human spleen, but enjoyed the additional 250 new experience points, another 10 pounds muggle, and other loot won from the successful attempt to defeat the Level 2 Weak Teenage Hooligans.

Gaining a T-Shirt and a pair of Fine Leather Combat Boots by defeating the two hooligans saw Harry's armor rating jump to a total of 8, due to his 3 Armor wearing skill which added 1 armor point per every 2 skill points. Harry's new armor rating saw future switchblade attacks dropping to only 2 damage per successful attack by the Hooligans. Even better than the new armor and loot was the new level he gained from the second win and additional 250 experience.

"Mission Failed." "Level Up!" Flashed before Harry's eyes as he once again purposefully failed to free the kneazle from the bag.

Harry immediately dumped all 4 of his new ability points into Dexterity; if he was going to be mining this mission for loot and experience, he didn't want to go through all the work just to miss a swing and kill the cat again.

"Woot!" Harry cheered as he saw his new stats.

**Level 3:**

**CURRENT EXP: **2125 **TOTAL EXP NEEDED FOR NEXT LEVEL: **3400

**Health: 13/13**

**Magic: N/A**

**Ability points to be allocated: 0**

**ABILITIES: **

Strength: 3

Dexterity: 8

Constitution: 2

Intelligence: 7

Wisdom: 4

Charisma: 1

**SKILLS: Skill Points to Allocate: **15

Armor Wearing: 3

Duel Wielding: 9

French language: 3

Herbology: 0

Pick-pocket: 6

Lock-Picking: 6

Muggle subjects: 30

Unarmed: 3

**PERKS:**

**Comprehending The Incomprehensible.**

Harry decided to once again save his skill points as he was holding out for magic skills, even if that lock-picking skill sounded helpful; especially with the Dursley's always locking him up in his cupboard.

Harry bit his lip in thought before nodding to himself, "Yep, going to hold off for a while. Not like I won't be grinding experience from these hooligans and get a chance to level again."

With that thought firmly in place, Harry looked at the available perks, and shivered again at the first two options, but the presence of three new perks interested him.

**Available Perks: 1 Perk Point available**

"**Hair Like Snape" **

"**Lemon-Drop Addiction"**

"**A Black Gene"**

"**A Summer Job"**

"**Arrr, Yer a Pirate!"**

"**Ninja Vanish!"**

"**Creature Comfort"**

"Hmm, what have we here? What is Arrr yer a pirate?" Harry clicked on the first new option.

"Arr ye seeking booty? Arrr Yer a Pirate gives you a 25% chance of getting better and more loot, and makes sure that even the smallest creature gives you at least a few extra coins. As an additional blessing, or curse, you will occasionally find yourself talking like a pirate. Probably best not to tell women you are there for their booty. Also, beware the ninja! Do you want to select "Arrr Yer a Pirate, Yes or No?"

Harry quirked an eyebrow and answered "No" before looking at the next new perk.

"Ninja Vanish! You gain the power of the ninja. When sneaking in shadows, you gain an extra +20 bonus to your sneak skill for as long as you are sneaking in the shadows. Your perk also gains you an addition 25% increased attack damage while performing sneak attacks. You also gain a permanent +5 to your Dual-Wielding skill. Pirates, or those with wooden legs, will be extra cautious around you due to your sneaky disposition. Do you want to select Ninja Vanish, Yes or No?

Harry wasn't sure what went into sneaking yet, so decided on answering No for now.

"Creature Comfort." Harry called out next, only for his eyebrows to rise almost to his hairline at the perk's description. "Not sure if you're one large step for mankind, or one giant step backwards, but you gain the ability to taste smells, see heat, and you can regenerate health faster than normal humans. You gain the ability to slowly regenerate health and regrow lost limbs without the use of healing potions or food. Still, you will be discriminated against by those who focus on blood status or discriminate against part creatures, you are afflicted by a -5 Charisma as frankly people who keep sticking out their tongues all the time are just weird, and the double eyelids are a bit freaky." Do you want to select Creature Comfort, Yes or No?

"Um, no, and a double no." Said Harry, as the idea of what would happen if his charisma went any lower was downright frightening.

Thus Harry learned that sometimes he wouldn't be able to select a perk that really spoke to him, or that was clearly an advantage to his chosen style of life, the universe, and everything in it.

"Um, I guess better loot sounds good in the long haul. Arrr Yer a Pirate, yes." Harry commanded to see the other perk options disappear along with the Level Up menu.

The teens were back, holding the bag that hissed and spat as it flailed in the grasp of the Level 2 Weak Teenage Hooligans.

Cracking his neck, and then his knuckles, Harry bounced on his toes twice and then jumped at the respawned teens.

"BANZI!" Harry screamed.

What followed was the sounds of shovels hitting flesh, the cracking voices of cockney teenagers going through puberty screaming for their "Mommy," and the occasional game announcement of "Shiv to the Spleen!"

* * *

"Bwa Ha HA Ha HA, Woot!" Harry cackled madly as he slaughtered the teens again and gained another level and load of loot, making him a total of Level 5.

The loot had been great, and for every time Harry attacked and killed the teenagers he now gained at least 25 pounds muggle, a full set of clothing, and at least one switchblade per round harvesting the teens; he really hoped he could sell off the excess armor and weapons at some point.

The Arrr Yer A Pirate perk had come in handy as one successful round of combat had even earned Harry the cream of the crop when it came to football Hooligan paraphernalia; a rare weapon that had Harry salivating: The Surrey Slugger.

The weapon's name didn't sound too threatening, until you realized it was a hooligan crafted cricket bat with nails sticking out of it along with the length of the paddle being wrapped in barbed wire. Stylistic punk metal and rock-n-roll drawings of devils and skulls covered the cricket bat, all painted in bright glow in the dark colors that made the eyes want to bleed upon looking at The Surrey Slugger. Couple those artistic elements with the 50% chance of unleashing the power of the Groin Stomp automatic follow-up attack, and it was a devastating weapon against enemies close to Harry's level. The Groin Stomp details were rather interesting also. When the Surrey Slugger's normal attack connected it knocked the enemy down due to its added knock-down damage and base stats of 10 melee attack/5 Defense. However when the power of the Groin Stop was triggered, the weapon allowed Harry to do a follow up Stomp to the Groin on the enemy, a stunning attack that immediately halved an enemy's remaining hit points and left the enemy crying about the children that would never be born. After equipping the weapon, Harry affectively one shot the Level 2 Weak Teenaged Hooligans every time Harry used it.

Harry's total experience was up, his loot and money were up, his armor was maxed out with what he could get from the hooligans, he had kick ass weapons in both hands, and he had even gained another 6 points to Dual-Wielding and 2 to Armor Wearing from repeatedly killing and harvesting the two teenagers.

Harry continued laughing madly as he again plugged in his skill points and marveled at his new abilities, and especially his magic.

**Level 5:**

**CURRENT EXP: **6125 **TOTAL EXP NEEDED FOR NEXT LEVEL: **7600

**Health: 17/17**

**Magic: 320/320**

**Ability points to be allocated: 0**

**ABILITIES: **

Strength: 4

Dexterity: 10

Constitution: 4

Intelligence: 8

Wisdom: 6

Charisma: 1

**SKILLS: Skill Points to Allocate: **29

Armor Wearing: 5

Duel Wielding: 15

French language: 3

Herbology: 0

Pick-pocket: 6

Lock-Picking: 6

Muggle subjects: 30

Unarmed: 3

In addition to his already owned perks of **Comprehending The Incomprehensible **and **Arrr Yer A Pirate, **for Level 4 Harry had chosen a new Perk option called "**I Have The Power**" which not only gave Harry an additional 100 points to his magic pool, but actually unlocked his magic skill simply due to the programming fact that it affected his magic pool.

Yes, Harry had affectively unlocked his magic early, hence the mad cackling.

It appeared that the game had expected Harry to be participating in a new level of the game by the time he reached Level 4; a level that included magic or at least accidental magic. Apparently the programmers hadn't expected a Harry Potter quite like the one they were dealing with; armed with the power of grinding and the patience to power level.

Due to Harry's grinding he had unleashed the power of the arcane earlier than expected in the game. Hence his mad cackling upon reaching level 5 and being given additional options.

If Harry's math was right, then every young wizard started out with a base magic of 100 points. Harry's abnormal Wisdom score of 6 gave him an additional 120 points which then was increased by the Perk "I Have The Power" for a total of 320 points.

Harry couldn't do anything magical yet when it came to skills, but that was soon to change as he examined a new perk that came available at level 5 called **"Are You Threatening Me?!"**

The description of "Are You Threatening Me?!" made Harry laugh in both glee and anticipation. "Are you a pyromaniac? Does the idea of somebody getting in your face make you twitch and immediately picture their greasy hair catching on fire? Well then my friend, this skill is for you. Your knowledge of the incendio spell has been so hardwired into your mind that fire is your bitch. No wand? We don't need no stinking wands. When threatened you have a 66% chance of automatically blasting your attacker with an instinctive wandless incendio, lighting your enemies on fire when your automatic attack hits. This instinctive counter-attack does not tap your magic pool. Do you want to select Are You Threatening Me?! Yes or No?"

"YES! Oh sweet Merlin Yes! Bwa ha ha ha ha! Fire, heh heh, fire." Harry cackled while rubbing his hands together in glee. The stress of the game and dying repeatedly had apparently unhinged Harry just a little bit.

"Spell learned: Incendio"

"WOOT!" Harry cheered even louder as he was awarded a spell simply because of the perk he chose.

The world unfroze around Harry, and the two teenagers were once again in front of him holding the bag with the cat in it.

Harry looked at the teens that were three levels below him, briefly noticing that when he focused on them the title that floated over their heads was grey in color rather than the blue or green color they had been previously.

"You know, you guys are getting too easy, haven't bloody landed a good hit on me since I hit Dexterity 8. I need something challenging to try my new spell on." Harry smirked and spoke to the two teenagers who didn't seem to hear Harry as he was standing a good five feet away from them and apparently out of aggravation range.

"Save game and Map." Harry stated, looking around for a challenge on his map while the game saved again. That's when he saw the missions "Nine Lives" and "Herding Cats" close by him, right around in the backyard of Ms. Figg's house; which he was standing in front of.

Harry shrugged, before strutting proudly into the squib's backyard.

Life was good for Harry. He had the best armor he could find, two specialty weapons, and more levels then he should at this point in the game, and damn-it, but Harry was proud of what he had accomplished.

Upon entering the backyard Harry saw Ms. Figg with a silver exclamation point floating over her head, calling to several kneazles scattered throughout the yard who were ignoring her. Immediately scoffing at the Herding Cats mission, Harry pushed his way through Ms. Figgs back hedges as his mini-map lead him to the secluded mission called Nine Lives; noticing that he seemed to be disappearing deeper and deeper into the hedges as if the space inside the bushes was larger than what could normally fit in Ms. Figg's backyard.

Green branches from the surrounding hedges bracketed the path, causing Harry to weave left and right and even up and under roots and branches to find the hidden mission location. Trees shaded the path, seeming to just appear as Harry pushed his way through the path.

Finally pushing through the last bit of branches, Harry stepped out—stepped out into what only could be called a feline gladiator arena.

Tiered hedges like arena seating were situated high above a clearing with a thorny gate across from Harry, the tiered hedges and even the tree branches above that, were filled with Kneazles of all colors and sizes; snacking on tuna and meowing to each other.

"I'm not sure if I ever could have imagined a sight like this, was this even here during my first life?" Harry asked incredulously, his face scrunched up in confusion as the cats around the arena ignored him.

Harry spun in a circle, looking around at all the kneazles who sat above him, protected by a high hedge wall were the tiered seating began and affording the cats a good view of the arena that was carpeted in a fine gravel of kitty litter. Completing his turn, the kitty litter crunching under Harry's feet, Harry noticed a sign written in red dripping letters pinned above the thorny gate.

"Abandon all hope ye who enter here! Beware Mr. Tibbles' Anger. Take heed for here dwells Mr. Tibbles the Terrible, destroyer of Sir Cuddlebum, and slayer of the once ferocious Ms. SnookieWookums."

Harry read the sign, his previous confusion at the arena dissolving into a chuckle at the combatants' names.

"The programmer who came up with this is stuff is crazy." Harry shook his head in mirth.

A gold mission exclamation point hovered between Harry and the thorny gate.

"Bah, bring it on Mr. Tibbles." Harry mocked with a sneer, armed with his full set of armor, his Surrey Slugger cricket bat along with a switchblade in the other hand, ready to unleash the full might of his incendio counter attack.

Harry stepped forward bravely into the golden exclamation point which disappeared in a shower of golden sparks as the gate in front of Harry dropped into the ground with a solid "Thud."

"Boom." The ground shook as the sound echoed through the arena.

The kneazles around the arena started mewling and hissing excitedly as all attention focused down on the arena floor, the cat sounds drowning out everything but the solid booming sound that came from behind the gate.

"Boom." The ground shook a second time, followed by a third, and then forth quicker booming sound as something moved closer.

It was at this point that Harry began to question his earlier comment about Mr. Tibbles. Harry paled as the footfalls drew closer and something moved in the shadows of the opening behind the former thorny gate, Harry readied himself for combat; white knuckles clutching his weapons tightly.

Just as a small white fluffy kitten with big green eyes and a pink ribbon and bow tied around its neck pranced out of the shadows behind the gate. The cute kitten's tale waved and flicked back and forth as the kitten's height barely reached Harry's shin; even with considering the fact that Harry was a very short four year old.

"This is Mr. Tibbles?" Harry asked incredulously before breaking out in hysterical laughter.

Mr. Tibbles ignored Harry's laughter and instead stopped shortly after exiting the shadowy gate, sat down, and then began to groom its dainty pink padded right paw with its cute tiny pink tongue.

If Harry hadn't been laughing so hard, hard enough that tears came to his eyes and he was struggling to breathe, he would have noticed that the "Mr. Tibbles" name floating above the kitten's head was a crimson blood red color with a blood red DarkMark included in the title; showing that something about this enemy was special in addition to being multiple levels higher than Harry's current level.

If Harry hadn't been laughing so hard, he might have even realized that even though Mr. Tibbles looked like a weak little kitten, Harry failed to gain initiative.

"Mr. Tibbles attacks with Baleful Glare. You're Marked for Death, insta-death in two rounds." Issued in Harry's vision as Mr. Tibbles stopped licking its paws briefly to glare a cute little glare at Harry.

"Wait, what?" Harry questioned, wiping his eyes and now surprisingly focused upon the game's mention of death.

"Automatic counter attack triggered, incendio!"

"No wait! Run away!" Harry frantically tried to countermand the auto-attack, but alas, it was not to be.

Mr. Tibbles continued to lick his little cute paw as a jet of flame appeared in the air in front of the startled Harry, the flame shooting forward at the little kitten.

The oncoming jet of flame headed right for the kitten, only at the last minute seeming to split and flow around both sides of the kitten and disappear down the shadowy opening in the arena wall. The fire didn't even singe the fluffy white kitten's perfectly groomed hair and dainty pink ribbon and bow.

"Incendio misses!"

"Wait, What!" Harry shouted, his eyes bugging out of his head.

It was at that point that Harry saw the most frightening thing in his life, even more frightening than Voldemort's AK heading towards his noggin.

Mr. Tibbles stopped licking his paw, and frowned at Harry.

It was definitely a frown, a cute frown but a frown none the less, and Harry realized that he had just made Mr. Tibbles angry—the very thing the sign warned him not to do.

Harry's last sight was Mr. Tibbles deploying a set of tiny razor sharp claws from the cute little paw the kitten had been licking.

"You made Mr. Tibbles Angry: Mr. Tibbles counter attacks."

* * *

The next thing Harry realized he was sitting up suddenly with a gasp and wide eyes, lying on an invisible black floor in a realm of darkness, a giant menu screen in front of him asking if he would like to load from a saved game.

Unfortunately Harry was too busy screaming in fear to reload his saved game.

"Don't make Tibbles Angry! Don't make him Angry!" Continued to echo over and over again into the darkness of the menu prompt.

* * *

**AN: Anyway, some great ideas from the readers were encapsulated in this chapter, but with a twist from my demented mind. The fact that I had to explain the abilities, skills, perks and what not made this chapter a little longer than I really wanted it to be. Still, it was necessary. This story is a mix of humor and adventure. That said, I now see why authors of Life as a Video Game often stop writing their stories; it's more than a bit difficult and time consuming to make sure that the numbers for experience, skills, loot etc. are correct and make sense and you have to account for every little detail or the readers will notice and you feel like an idiot. I really like the idea of perks as I believe Fallout and Elder Scrolls games have a lot to offer in the area of game mechanics. That said, it's damn difficult to keep things balanced and yet fun and adding to the plot in addition to modifying Harry's abilities while not making him a Gary Stu. Ok, and now I really need to thank everybody who left me a review or sent me a pm with an idea or even just an "I liked it." Seriously, over 270 reviews for two chapters?! Woot! You people are freaking amazing. I really appreciate it and hope you all continue to enjoy the story. Cheers!**


	4. Chapter 4: They Call It A Grind

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or the characters of his universe, I just play in that sandbox for fun and without pay or any form of remuneration other than reviews and private messages; which are fortunately non-taxable.

**AN: You freaking kidding me? Over 510 reviews with only 3 chapters?! And the host of ideas, they've been great and some have inspired me to play out other options as your thoughts helped prompt my muse and add to the chaos in my mind. Thanks for the following and I hope you continue to enjoy the story. As for updates, sorry it took so long for this chapter to come out, I've traveled multiple time zones for business and the all-day meetings and lack of real sleep at night means that I've only had about a half an hour a day to type. That said, here's the next installment and keep those ideas coming. Cheers!**

* * *

'_Thoughts are in italics'_

"Things Said, or Things Written"

**Chapter 4: They Call It A Grind For A Reason**

Harry had worked off the fear through the therapeutic practice known as "screaming his head off." Yes, Harry Potter had moved beyond the fear, passed go, did not collect 200 dollars, and went straight to angry. Angry at Mr. Tibbles, but also angry at himself. And nobody liked either one of them when they were angry. Why people didn't like Mr. Tibbles when the kneazle was angry was pretty self-explanatory, the little kneazle was downright frightening.

Why people didn't like Harry when he was angry, well, it was because he was a broody emo little bastard and was annoying to be around; just like the level 1 charisma warning stated.

Harry sat on the invisible floor, legs splayed out in front of him and hands resting behind him on the dark surface of the floating nothingness. He just sat there, in the dark, and stewed as he stared at the large screen floating in front of him asking if he wanted to reload from a saved game.

"I've been a bloody fucking idiot. More nutty than a Lovegood and more prideful than a Malfoy." Harry cursed at himself in a bout of self-loathing.

"Griffindor, griffindor, griffindor, bloody griffiindor has to go be the one always running forward and never looking back to see if he missed something or trod over something in our path. Bah!" Harry threw his arms up in the air from his seated position and slumped backwards, his head rebounding off the rather hard but invisible floor.

Harry welcomed the pain in the back of his head as it helped to focus his thoughts.

He mentally cursed his lack of foresight in not spending more time just grinding his strength and stamina skills up. He berated himself for not stopping to realize that he could have just reloaded from his last auto-save that happened before he was thrown out of the school and the library, and he doubly cursed himself for not taking better advantage of his saved spots. He had been acting exactly like the Harry that had gone off to let Voldemort kill him, and he didn't like that Harry.

Harry thought to himself, _'This is a game, yet it's not a game, it's my life and I can't lose focus of that for one moment. I need to save more often, grind everything, loot everything, and use that Slytherin cunning that saw me survive the Dursleys without dying of malnutrition by the age of 10. There is a way to win this game, whatever the ending, and I'm going to find it."_ After all, games were meant to be won by somebody, and it was his goal to be the winner this time.

A minute passed as he silently thought to himself as he lay on his back and stared into the darkness, the only light issuing off the floating screen.

Another minute passed, and Harry finally had enough of his own brooding.

"Bah! Enough of this." Harry pushed himself up with one swift motion and then bounced to his feet.

"Screw you programmer, I'm going to beat you." Harry growled, shaking his fist at the large glowing screen in front of him.

"I'm going to do every mission in this stupid tutorial level. I'm going to discover every hidden item, every golden snitch and every way that I can milk your bloody stupid program for all its worth. I'm going to cheat so badly that if people knew what I was doing they would think that I was pulling a Draco Malfoy taking a potions exam in Snape's class." Harry growled, and then glared at the screen as he continued to speak from between his teeth, "And I'm going to Kill Mr. Tibbles, mark my words."

Harry paused, his teeth grinding together in anger as he waited to see if he would get a response. Yet just like the last time, none was forthcoming. And yet, he had learned the grinder's motto: the level isn't done until every bit of experience is milked; every item, no matter how worthless, collected; and every defeatable enemy crushed.

"Would you like to reload from a saved game, yes or no?" Was the only response as it continued to shine from the screen in front of him.

"Reload last save." Harry growled, and the world around him flashed, depositing him in front of the two teenagers holding the kitten in the bag.

Harry pulled out the Surrey slugger and stepped forward towards the first of the two teens, who turned towards Harry once Harry stepped within the 5 foot range.

"Avast Matey!" Harry growled, his "Arr Yer a Pirate" perk affecting his words, as Harry put both hands on his cricket bat and pulled it back over his shoulder as he stepped forward while winding up his entire body.

"Wait, what?" The teen closest to Harry answered, totally confused as he turned around, just in time to get Harry's two handed swing of the Surrey Slugger right to the face.

"Face Shot, Critical hit! Knockdown! Groin Stomp activated!"

"Arrrrrr!" Harry cheered and hoisted the Surrey Slugger in the air in triumph as he took out his frustration by pulling his knee to his chest before depositing the heel of his combat boot firmly in the fallen teen's groin and giving it an extra twist; all while making eye contact with the other teenager.

"Oy, that's just not right—Run Away!" The second teenager paled as he saw Harry's brutality, dropped the bag with the cat and sprinted away before Harry could attack him.

"One Level 2 Weak Teenage Hooligan defeated, 0 experience, +1 Two-Handed skill. Loot body? Y or N?"

"Aye ya bloody bastard," Harry growled in reply, which the games programming translated to a "yes." Harry didn't even care that he was talking like a pirate at the moment, he was just frustrated.

"You found 1 Leather Jacket, 1 Switchblade and 15 pounds muggle."

"Grrrrr." Harry's growl was the only reply, as apparently the greyed out names meant he wouldn't get any more experience from defeating the teenagers, and apparently they had learned the same lesson as he had from Mr. Tibbles. Dangerous things came in little cute packages; though at least on Harry the leather jacket and barbwire wrapped cricket bat were a bit of a giveaway as to the dangerous part.

"Release kneazle and complete mission? Y, N?" Flashed above the bag that was moving on the ground as the cat inside struggled to get loose.

"I swear to god, if you're anything like Mr. Tibbles I'm going to skin you and wear you for a hat—ah, who am I kidding, I'd probably pee myself." Harry groused to himself as the pirate perk stopped forcing him to speak like a privateer and he reached down to the bag and pulled open the loose tie that was holding the bag shut.

"Saved the Kneazle! Mission success, +200 Experience and +5 to Care For Magical Creatures."

The bag flopped open and a flat faced ugly ball of mottled orange and brown fur tumbled out of the bag and then looked up at Harry.

Harry glared down at the kneazle kitten while clothed in all his hooligan glory: leather jacket, punk-rock t-shirt, jeans and combat boots, holding the Surrey Slugger as it rested on his shoulder.

In return, the kitten looked up at Harry, blinked incredibly cute eyes up at him, and then purred before rubbing up against Harry's leg.

Kneazles were magical felines and despite all Harry's anger and frustration he was still a trustworthy and good guy, and Kneazles could tell that type of thing.

"Yeah yeah fuzzball." Harry sighed, put his cricket bat away in his inventory, and leaned down to pet the little kitten and felt his earlier anger start to leave him.

The kneazle kitten pushed its head into Harry's hand and then moved its head until Harry's fingers found the spot just behind and under the kitten's ear, the kitten's purr becoming even louder when Harry's scratching fingers rubbed the right spot.

Harry couldn't help but smile, the kitten's actions helped relieve the last remnants of stress and frustration at getting his ass kicked by Mr. Tibbles.

Like most cats, the kitten only stayed still to get pet for a few moments before deciding that it wanted to be elsewhere and scampered off for Ms. Figg's cat door on the front of her house; not to be confused with the cat door on the side of Ms. Figg's house, the cat door on the other side of her house, or the cat door on the back of her house.

Harry just shook his head as he stood up, and smiled.

Looking around, Harry paused as his focus rested on the path around the side of Ms. Figg's house; towards where he knew the Herding Cat's and now infamous Nine Lives missions were.

Harry had a plan, or at least a small semblance of a plan in a very rough almost lack of a plan type of plan. Ok, so he knew he needed to get better and that was about it, he wasn't Hermione after all. Alright, so he was still going to fly by the seat of his pants, but he knew where he could start, just like he had at the beginning.

"It's time to finish exploring this place and hopefully gain some more strength and bonuses." Harry said with a big inhale of air which he held before letting it out along with the tension he had been holding.

"But first, we have to do something with this body, and what Aunt Petunia doesn't know will actually make her roses healthier." Harry smirked, pulled out his Hufflepuff Shovel and brought it down with a loud sloppy chopping sound as he disposed of the body in the tried and true Hufflepuff style; he was making fertilizer.

"+1 to Herbology!" The game cheerfully stated.

* * *

"Snape's Septic Scalp Wash! Does every one of these bloody golden snitches have to reside in the most awkward spot possible?!" Harry cursed as he pulled himself up to the apex of a neighbor's roof five blocks away from number 4 Privet Drive. Golden snitch number 5 for Harry was darting back and forth, dodging Harry's grasping right hand while his left hung on tightly to the horse shaped weathervane on the absolute summit of the roof. It had been a tough climb, a bounce onto a hedge, then pulled himself up onto a drain spout that barely held his four year old weight, then a scamper up the pipe while watching his stamina bar slowly decrease; hoping that he reached the roof before his stamina bar wore out and no doubt dropped him to the ground two stories below. The other snitches hadn't been any easier to catch being at the top of trees, dangling above the top of the monkey bars at the park, or this one here on the top of a two story house. The fact that the snitches were all hidden at high altitudes in tough to reach spots made sense in that weird dark humor "let's make Harry suffer" type of way, and Harry really was beginning to expect that type of thing from the bastard who was programming his life's game.

Harry swung his right hand at the rapidly dodging golden snitch which was so far keeping out of his grasp.

"Why!" Harry swung his hand to the right as the snitch dodged to the left and Harry growled at the snitch through his teeth.

"Won't!" Harry swung his hand to the left to try and catch it again but missed again as the snitch darted right above Harry's head.

"Stay!" Harry growled as he let go of the weathervane with his left hand and attempted to use both hands to clasp the snitch between both hands, but the snitch dodged downwards and hovered right in front of Harry's eyes.

"Still! Ah Ha! Got ya." Harry cheered as he darted forward with both hands and snagged the snitch.

"Congratulations, you caught a golden snitch! 5/200 caught. +500 Experience and unlock cheat code "Bobble-Head characters."

"What the hell, all of that for-" Harry's incredulous statement was cut off by the fact that he realized he was falling.

The snitch seemed to dissolve into whatever place captured snitches disappeared to, which didn't really help Harry one way or the other as he plummeted forward while flailing his arms like some demented penguin that forgot it was a flightless bird.

"Craaaaaapppp-iiiittt!" Harry shouted as he and his voice disappeared over the edge of the house as gravity took control; closing his eyes and covering his head right before he landed in the neighbor's bushy begonias and barely missed the large rose bush.

"Owww" Harry gasped as he flopped over, lying on his back once again and staring up at the sky as five of his precious hearts disappeared and became grey ghosts of what they once were.

"Ding! Congratulations, you've received the trophy "I can Fly!—Nope, I was wrong." Fall more than two stories and live to tell about it. We suggest using a broom next time."

"Har, Har, Har." Harry groused between gasping for the air that had been knocked out of his lungs; his mock laughter prefaced by two fingers being thrust once again into the air.

This was getting to be a reoccurring theme…

* * *

"Bobble-heads, all that bloody work for something that just makes everybody's heads extra-large and go all wibbly-wobbly. Bah!" Harry groused, going back into the menu commands and turning off the cheat code for Bobble-Heads.

"Maybe if I was trying to take pot shots at enemies from a distance that would be helpful, but otherwise that was a complete waste of time." He snarked to himself as he bounced down the road after fully discovering the rest of the Little Whinging neighborhood.

He'd gained more levels in stamina and another +3 to strength in the time he had been bouncing around, not to mention finding and capturing the other four golden snitches. The Little Whinging neighborhood was boring, other than the school and the park it was nothing but homes that he couldn't get into; some of the doors appeared to be just paintings and not even real doors.

"How the hell did I miss that last time." Harry groused to himself, realizing that the ill-fitting and nonprescription glasses Petunia had forced upon Harry in his last life really were that bad, or he had been an absolute idiot not to notice the problem with doors that weren't doors.

He needed a break from the monotony and then he was going to try and sneak into the Dursley's house and see if he couldn't steal some of his aunt's hair-pins so he could get back into the school. But for now he was ready for a bit of adventure.

Harry approached the mission called, "We're Making Whoopie" and couldn't help but think that he had heard that phrase somewhere before. The Polkis house, where the mission was located, was right down the street from the Dursleys' and looked remarkably similar to every other house on the block. The grass was mowed short and not a leaf or branch nor piece of garbage marred the pristine grassy yard. In fact, the only difference between the Polkis house and the other houses on the block was the milk truck parked in the driveway. Harry thought he remembered that Mr. Polkis worked at a bank during the day but that was so long ago considering it was from his early first life that he could have been wrong. Shrugging to himself, Harry bounced out of the backyard and towards the side of Piers Polkis's house where the silver exclamation point hovered.

"Dee-Do, We're Making Whoopie. The back window of the Polkis house is open, and you are hearing terrible screams and the sounds of shattering glass issue from the house. Best be quiet and sneak up to see what is happening. Mission reward 100 experience and +10 to sneak skill."

"Sounds easy enough, but how do I sneak?" Harry asked, and helpfully enough a tutorial popped up just as if it expected to receive that very question.

"Thieves do it from behind." The tutorial was titled before describing the game mechanics, "Queensbury rules to difficult for you? You'd rather be a dishonorable, unchivalrous, backstabbing, underhanded rogue would you? Well jolly good on you old chap! Sneaking allows you to not be heard and hopefully not be seen if you do it right and have the right level of skill. Become a master of the Sneak skill and enemies will lose sight of you when you drop into sneak while in combat, allowing you to break off attacks that relying on sight to target you and allowing you to deal devastating bonus damage and get a bonus to initiative and surprise attacks when you are sneaking and deliver a backstab. To sneak, all you need to do is crouch down and watch that you stay out of vision of the target or targets you are hiding from. The easiest way to do this is to stay quiet and stay behind your target, staying in their blind spots and hugging to the shadows where it is harder to see you; staying still in the shadows is particularly helpful. Your sneaking skill will increase as you stay hidden from your targets, neither making too much sound nor being seen. You can tell if you are seen by how open the eye in the middle of your screen is or how far you go into the red on the "sneaky sound meter" while you are in sneak mode. Try it out, but stay quiet. Be warned that you will cause a lot of noise when first learning to sneak."

The tutorial shut and the words "Sneak skill 0" popped up in his vision before fading away.

"This doesn't look so hard." Harry said to himself with a smirk as he looked across the soft grass and clear yard towards the window that was open about ten meters away.

Harry crouched down, and took one step forward.

"Crack!" A loud cracking sound quickly drew Harry's attention downwards to see a stick crunched under his foot.

"What the hell." Harry whispered in confusion, looking around to make sure the rest of his path towards the house was clear.

Harry took another step, only for his foot to get stuck in a bucket.

"Ack!" Harry tried to stay crouched yet hopped on one foot while trying to get his left foot out of the bucket- only to step on a garden rake that hadn't been there before.

"Thwack!" The rake shot up like something out of a slapstick comedy routine and smacked Harry right in the nose.

"Merwin's Bwuddy Buggers!" Harry clutched his crushed nose and cursed as his eyes leaked tears and a part of a heart disappeared; fortunately the bucket fell off his foot and he was able to stop hopping around long enough to make sure his nose wasn't bleeding.

Harry looked in front of him to double check that the path was clear, and sure enough, there wasn't a single twig, bucket, rake or other noise producing product situated in his path. He only had roughly 5 meters left to go to get to the window, and he needed to stay as quiet as possible.

If he hadn't been convinced before this, Harry's next 5 meters truly showed that the game programmers had it out for him.

First it was the pinecones crunching under his step.

Then a tin pail full of pence coins got stuck on his foot and rattled like crazy until he could get it off.

Then the game put a pile of fine china plates in his path that he knocked over with a crash.

Then a bike's horn which he stepped on and caused it to honk.

And finally there was the sleeping dog's tail he accidentally stepped on, causing the dog to howl and yip as it ran away scared.

Finally he reached the window, and it was a surprise he hadn't failed the mission for how loud he had been.

But apparently not as surprising as what he saw when he looked in the window.

Mrs. Polkis was a big lady, about 350 pounds, and the mustache wearing milk man thrusting between her naked thighs was definitely close to 400; and also not Mr. Polkis. Several milk bottles had fallen off the table causing a mix of glass and milk to cover the floor while Mrs. Polkis was sprawled out totally naked and covered in milk laying on the kitchen table while the two of them looked like a couple of mating walrus.

"AAAAAAAAAHHHHH My Eyes!" Harry screamed in anguish as he stumbled back from the window.

"Mission failed! You made too much noise." Popped up in the visuals of the screen, but Harry ignored it as he was pawing at his eyes.

"I can't get it out of my head! I can't get it out of my head!" Harry whimpered before turning to the bushes and throwing up the most recently eaten burnt bacon.

Harry closed his eyes, and a moment later when he opened them he was again standing in front of the mission for "We're Making Whoopie." Once again the path to the back window was free and clear of any obstructions and there were no signs of the items that would cause noise if Harry attempted to walk towards the window; not that he wanted to do so.

Harry paled further when he thought about attempting the mission again.

"Uh, there has got to be a better way to gain levels in sneak, Urp!" Harry almost puked again but covered his mouth and swallowed it again at the thought of having to see that horrible image again just to gain some experience.

Harry turned away from the mission and looked back towards the front of the house, hoping to see something that could distract his imagination from the horror that had been imprinted in his mind.

The mailman walking down the sidewalk waved at Harry as he passed, which was weird because Harry had already seen the man circle this block and deliver the mail here at least once if not twice today.

Harry waved back, only to stop mid-wave as a new idea came to his mind.

"Maybe—Nah, it can't be that easy." Harry said to himself, his arm stopped in the air as he thought, only to realize he was standing there looking like an idiot and dropped his hand.

Harry looked around as the mail man delivered mail to the next door neighbors and walked back towards the sidewalk. Harry realized this was the same mailman who had ignored the fact that Harry had killed and stripped two teenage hooligans right in the middle of the sidewalk and in bright daylight.

"Well, it wouldn't hurt to try." Harry said with a shrug before crouching down and activating sneak mode as he tailed the mailman.

"Squeek!"

"Crunch!"

"Honk!"

"Beep!"

"Yip!"

Every step made a new sound as Harry silently flipped the bird towards the sky; Harry's bird flipping being the only silent thing about him at the moment.

"+1 Sneak" Flashed in his vision as he smirked.

"It's worth the annoyance" Harry said with a smirk, his combat boots briefly turning into a pair of clown shoes that honked with each step before suddenly turning back to normal combat boots.

Harry would continue to follow the mail man, slowly but surely making less and less noise, becoming stealthier and stealthier as time went by and he continued to gain levels in sneak while the mailman in front of Harry never bothered to turn around.

* * *

Eighty nine points.

That was Harry had gained 89 points in sneak before he hit the wall and couldn't sneak any more. The day spent following the mailman had been very successful. More area traversed, another plus 3 to strength gained along with multiple levels in stamina, and like stated before 89 points towards his sneak skill.

Harry was the wind, he was as one with the silence of night even in the middle of the daytime, he was like an house elf playing the silence game, he was well on the path to being one sneaky son of a bitch; and even Lily Potter referred to herself as a bitch during a certain time of the month and she would have agreed that her son was now very sneaky.

Yes, all was smooth sailing for Harry Potter as he silently crept behind the ever whistling ever walking Little Whinging Mailman.

The hours had past for Harry in mindless sneaking, and long gone were the occasional bouts of honking clown shoes suddenly appearing on his feet. Long gone were the sudden buckets, twigs, pinecones or rakes appearing in his path and underfoot. He could have kept going, well if it was his choice he would have. But he really hit a wall.

And by hitting the wall, Harry literally went face first into a wall and wasn't able to sneak forward any more.

Come rain or shine or dark of night, nothing could stop the mailman—not even the invisible wall that separated Little Whinging and Big Whinging. The problem was Harry apparently didn't have the same powers of movement as the non-player character mailman.

Harry hit the wall with a crunch, which was his nose going crunch followed by his forehead ricocheting off the invisible surface spanning the sidewalk, followed then by his inertia causing his body to smash into the wall and sending him stumbling back as his arse hit the sidewalk.

"Morgana's Mouthful Mammaries that hurt!" Harry sat on the concrete cursing as he clutched his nose, his eyes watering from the sudden pain to his face.

"Did somebody forget to tell Hagrid not to stand on the street under an invisibility cloak?" Harry asked, not expecting an answer as he reached out with the hand that wasn't busy clutching his noggin and felt around until his hand came in contact with the solid invisible surface.

Harry's touch failed to feel anything but a smooth hard surface under his fingers. It wasn't hot, it wasn't cold, and there were no feelings of a tingling enchantment or a shimmering cloak of invisibility. It was just an invisible wall that was hard and as unmoving as solid steel yet strangely porous as the light and even the breeze filtered through it unhindered. In fact, the only thing it seemed to do was keep Harry locked into this little chunk of Surrey.

Harry shook his head and pushed his way to his feet.

Harry turned his head to the left and right, moving his head until the side of his cheek pressed against the hard invisible surface as he tried to see if he could figure out if there was any way to see how far the wall extended.

Harry couldn't remember heading into Big Whinging in his previous life; Petunia and Vernon considered Big Whinging the wrong side of town for such 'upstanding citizens' as themselves. Rather the Dursleys preferred to shop at the pricier stores in London even though it was more of a drive and cost more, but then again the Dursleys were the type of pretentious fobs who cared about their brand of toilet paper even though it was exactly the same as the cheaper brand and just had a different label slapped on it.

"It seems to span the entire street." Harry mumbled to himself, placing his hands against the invisible wall and moving laterally out into the street while lifting and then pressing each hand against the surface. Harry walked while moving his hands one next to the other against the wall and across the street onto the grass of the neighbor across the street from where he had started.

Out of the corner of his eye Harry could see a little picket fence that was easy to step over, and Harry picked his way through the many ornate stone lawn gnomes that spanned the neighbor's grass, focusing most of his attention as he tried to feel if there were any breaks in the invisible wall so he could explore the rest of the world.

"Get off me Damn lawn ya bloody Mime!" A voice from Harry's right startled him and caused him to quickly look at the front porch to where an old pensioner with a beard and crazy hairstyle walked out his door shaking an iron pipe in Harry's direction while clothed in cargo shorts and an open Hawaiian shirt. "I know ya bloody mimes are after me lawn gnomes and you won't get em without a fight!"

Harry was about to argue that he wasn't a mime, but then noticed two things.

First, Harry was in fact doing a fair imitation of a mime pretending to have an invisible wall in front of him.

Second, upon taking one look at the old pensioner Harry's blood went cold.

"Old Man Henderson" was the name hovering over the man's head; only rather than crimson red or any color Harry had seen before it was a light absorbing black and bore in italics the word "_Invincible" _next to his title.

It was at this point that Harry realized that the creators of his so called video game life were serious about keeping Harry from trying to get over, under or around this particular invisible wall. Because if Mr. Tibbles was crimson red, then Harry didn't want anything to do with a character as crazy and as high leveled as to have a level and title as black and promising death as Old Man Henderson's.

Harry turned around, knocked over a lawn gnome in the process, and sprinted like the very elder gods of hell were after him.

"Blasted gosh darn mimes, their always after me gnomes." The old man said to himself as he set his lawn gnome back up and went back into his house.

Harry in turn was long gone, out of sight, and promising never to try and seek a path into Big Whinging again.

* * *

"Ok, You can do this Harry, you can do this!" Harry pumped himself up for what he was about to do, bouncing on his toes and shaking his head back and forth to loosen up his neck as he prepared for what promised to be the biggest challenge to date.

"Every bit of experience gained, every item collected, every enemy crushed. Every bit of Experience gained, every item collected, every enemy crushed." Harry mumbled this statement to himself several times like a holy mantra that would hopefully protect him; praying to the patron saint of game grinders.

"You've upped your sneak, and there is nothing to stop you now, I can do this, I Can Do This." Harry finished with a growl, punched the mission exclamation point and quickly crept forward.

The sight of two walrus's mating in human form once again hit Harry in the gut like a sucker punch.

"Murphle!" Harry shoved his fist into his mouth to stifle the scream of anguish as he fell to his knees and dry heaved his empty stomach; the taste of bile in his mouth.

"Ding! Mission Complete! +100 experience and +10 to sneak." The screen cheerfully flashed before Harry's vision.

Harry didn't even notice, his glassy pale eyes stuck in a thousand yard stare as he mumbled to himself over and over again.

"The horror… The horror."

* * *

Harry walked past the three Dursley chore missions when he read in the mission details that completion of them would advance time and end the tutorial; Harry wasn't leaving this level without milking it for all the experience possible, getting back into the school, and most of all defeating Mr. Tibbles.

Harry walked up to the front of the Dursley house and crouched down before silently opening the front door, all 99 of his hard earned sneak points coming in handy.

"Did you hear about what happened to Helen Matherson from down the street?" One of the ladies in the neighborhood gossip/book club asked snidely before taking a sip of tea.

One or two women twittered, and Harry heard Petunia cut in, "About her husband being demoted at work and them having to move because they can't make the mortgage? My dear Dorthy, where have you been, that is practically last month's news."

Harry peaked around the corner of the foyer and into the living room where Petunia was smugly smiling at another lady who was frowning at Petunia's dig and undermining. Both women were hiding their respective looks politely behind tea cups and were staring at each other.

Harry took that opportunity to sneak up the stairs, hop silently over the squeaky board above Harry's cupboard that Dudley liked to jump on in the mornings, and pad up to the upstairs bedrooms.

The house's upstairs was a treasure trove of knick knacks to be collected.

"Gained one box of broken jagged jacks, Gained one box of matches, Gained one pack of cigarettes, Gained one can of dipping tobacco. Found one hundred pounds muggle."

"Merlin, apparently Dudley was an early bloomer on the controlled substances." Harry whispered wide eyed as he went through Dudley's second bedroom and found Dudley's secret stash; and quite a stash it was for a kindergartner. Harry had lived in the second bedroom for several years, so knew all the good hiding spots. Not to say that Dudley had used one of the good spots, rather the stash was merely hidden under a pile of worn out toy trucks and other broken toys.

Other than the secret stash and the broken jacks, the jacks being listed as a weapon in Harry's inventory, Harry only found one other item of note that was worthwhile. "Gained one dog squeaky toy." Harry recognized it as a chew toy that Marge Dursley had given her nephew Dudley so that Dudley and her bulldogs could play together; that is when Dudley and the dog's favorite game of choice wasn't 'fetch the freak' aka chase Harry up a tree.

"Ding!" A tutorial popped up in Harry's vision when he picked up the squeaky toy. "Be vewy vewy qwuiet, its hunt'n season." The tutorial was titled before diving into more in depth discussion on Harry's latest find.

"Congratulations, you've found bait. Bait can be used to draw animals or creatures to a specific location so they can be collected, corralled or even hunted. Some items have multiple use as both ingredients for food, craft items as well as being used for bait. Trust us, the bait works very well for its particular type of target creature."

"Trust you? Trust you to screw me over more like." Harry groused before the item disappeared into Harry's inventory. Then it was onto Dudley's bedroom.

Now most people would think that Dudley's bedroom would be a sloppy mess, and frankly you would be right if it was left up to Dudley. However Dudley Dursley's bedroom was almost always kept pristine.

Every day Dudley would get out of bed, leaving behind a wet spot because he hadn't learned not to soil his bedding at night, scratch his bum, and head to the shower. As soon as Dudley left the door Petunia would come in, straighten up the room, change out the sheets and padding for clean dry linens, and give the room a nice spritz of lemon air-freshener to hide the manly sweat smell of her darling pudgy boy.

Into this room crept one Harry Potter.

"Jackpot!" Harry quietly cheered, for on the shelves were several never opened books that glowed the hue of skill books.

"The Pugilist, Queensbury rules" gave Harry an additional +3 to Unarmed combat. The rest of the books made Harry laugh as well as gain levels, as the titles were perfect for Dudley even though none of the books had ever been opened.

"French language for dummies," +3 to French.

"Chemistry for Dummies," +3 to Muggle Subjects.

"History for Dummies," +3 to Muggle Subjects.

With a final "Math for Dummies," +3 to Muggle Subjects, Harry had opened the sum total of books in Dudley's collection that were worthwhile. To be fair to Dudley, even the books for dummies were at a higher reading level than a four year old should be able to read. However fortunately for Harry he wasn't your average 4 year old and could actually get a benefit besides just being able to read them. The other books on the shelves weren't so helpful seeing as how they were children's books of the variety of "See spot run", "The Happy Little Alphabet" and "Put your Poop in the Toilet, not in your Pants;" the helpful potty training book touted by Ms. Polkis for helping her little boy learn where and where not to go potty.

Harry didn't think spending the time needed to study those books would be that helpful so he skipped those. Still, Harry looted Dudley's dresser drawers, avoiding the underwear drawer after one look to make sure it didn't contain any loot, and from Dudley's bedside dresser found a box of donuts that was surprisingly fresh along with two bags of candy which he added to his inventory. And thus Harry was introduced to the tutorial on stealing.

"Actually, Crime does pay; it's the penalties that hurt." Was the title of the tutorial, and the explanation seemed to follow along with that theme. "Well boys and girls, its time you learned how to gain wealth and glory through the joys of theft. Theft is your friend, it helps feed you, clothe you in awesome gear, and make sure you are kitted out with the best weapons while dripping in jewels. That said, don't get caught. In the Muggle world, getting caught means you get beat by the police or store owners, you go to jail and lose all your stolen loot plus have to pay a fine or get locked up in prison with only one hairpin to attempt to pick the lock. In the Magical world, getting caught means you may be cursed by guards, aurors or store owners, and have to pay a fine or possibly spend time in Azkeban with no hope for a hairpin. Neither of these outcomes is good for you. Hence stealing in front of people is probably a bad idea unless you are looking to start a fight. To know if you are stealing, use common sense. If the item is in a store or somebody's personal belongings it's probably not yours for the taking without being called theft. What, you thought we would color something red and ask you if you wanted to steal the item every time you look to pick something up? Ha!"

Harry read the tutorial, and shrugged. "I'm still going to loot the Dursley's for everything I can take." He said to himself before creeping down the hall towards Vernon and Petunia's room, with a slight stop in the bathroom.

"You gain 25 hair pins." The screen stated while Harry smiled, having looted Petunia's complete supply of bobby pins.

"Mwa ha ha ha ha." Harry chuckled a bit unhinged as he crept into his aunt's and uncle's room and began to go through their things.

"You stole diamond earrings, you stole two gold rings, you stole 250 pounds muggle, you stole one silver money clip, you stole ornate broach, you stole pearl necklace." Harry cleaned out the jewelry container and Vernon's spare money clip and cackled with a smile.

The smile quickly fled Harry's face when he heard the front door slam beneath him and Vernon stomp in the front door of the house.

"Just home for a quick stop pet, good report at work, have to grab my money and spare money clip because we are going out to the pub after work." Vernon's voice echoed up the stairs along with the sound of Vernon's feet.

"Ding, random events," Popped into Harry's vision while he frantically looked for a place to hide. Harry flung aside the comforter on the bed only to see that the mattress rested on a box and there was no space where he could hide under the bed.

"In this tutorial we will learn about random events and enemy spawns. Throughout the world random events will take place that you can take advantage of or enemies can appear forcing you to fight them or run away. Some events are triggered by you stepping in a certain spot or triggering a set item, some are completely random. Just another way we keep your life exciting! Cheers!"

"Worse than walrus mating," Harry cursed, trying to keep as quiet as possible as he looked at the bedroom's closet and quickly rushed to it. Harry quickly pulled the sliding closet doors open and then closed behind him as he heard Vernon reach the top of the stairs and enter the hallway headed straight for the bedroom.

Harry finished quietly shutting the door just as he watched through the closing crack as Vernon made his way into the room and headed towards where the money clip had been before Harry's pilfering.

In the darkness of the now closed closet, Harry heard Vernon talking to himself in the bedroom.

"Now where did I put that money clip?" Vernon's statement was followed by the heavy breathing and creaking of furniture as if the large man was getting down onto his knees to look under the dresser while using the wooden cabinet to balance his prodigious weight.

"Damn, it's not there." Vernon's muffled voice cursed before being raised to the point it rattled the closet doors. "Petunia, where did I put my spare money clip, you know, the silver one your father gave me when we were married?" He shouted.

"Shite." Harry cursed, not realizing the importance of the money clip when he stole it along with the money it contained.

"Did you try the pants I hung for you in the closet?" Petunia's voice echoed up the stairs.

Harry's eyes went large, "Double Shite." He cursed.

Vernon pushed his way to his knees and then his feet, using the dresser again to help pull himself up and ignoring the creaking sound the wood made when it struggled to withstand his weight.

Vernon smiled down at the dresser and then patted his tummy. "Good solid English stock." He complimented himself, his mustache twitching before heading for the closet.

Vernon threw open the closet doors.

* * *

"It's not in these pants Pet!" Vernon's voice echoed through the wall and into the crawl space where Harry quietly scurried. A muffled reply was the only thing Harry could hear through the small painted plywood cover for the attic crawlspace's door as Petunia must have answered. Harry then heard Vernon curse under his breath, the sound of the closet slamming was then followed by the thuds of the overweight man disappearing out of the bedroom.

Harry didn't have a light spell, and barely any light trickled in from the few louvers that allowed the attic to vent moist air and reduce the possibility of mold during the damp English weather.

Still, Harry did have one possible light source.

"Inventory." Harry ordered, and then fished around in the dark until his hand closed around a box of matches rather than the assorted stacks of waffles and the one still living fish.

Harry struck a match, and as it flared he looked around in the dim light.

Yellowed wedding dress, assorted cardboard boxes, a few broken pieces of what would have been antique furniture, and one large Hogwarts student chest.

Harry's eyes went large.

"Woot!" Harry cried out, quickly followed by sputtering curses as the match burned down and burned his fingers causing him to quickly wave the match and extinguish it before sucking on his fingers.

Rather than light another match, Harry crawled forward in the dark feeling his way towards the chest and finally finding it by its leather wrapped wood edges; the hatch easily popping open without the need for a key.

"Ta-DA! Congratulations, you've found a secret chest! Lily's Hogwarts Chest Found! Secret chests are secreted throughout the game in secret areas and give special secret prizes. We used secret four times in the last sentence, that's what makes these chests so secret!" The words that popped up in Harry's vision were accompanied by a flash of golden light and glitter exploding out of the chest and all over Harry.

Unfortunately Harry's mouth was open in surprise, thus ensuring he got a mouth full of the glitter.

"Ptttbth, ptttt, ptuey." Harry spat, then spat again and finally wiped his tongue, not amused by the mouth full of glitter that accompanied the finding of some of his mother's possessions.

"You gained 1/2 of the Potter Gold Heart Locket! One half of set." Was accompanied by a sweetheart locket that had Lily's face smiling up at Harry from one side, the other side missing as if it had been given to another person. The picture in the locket was obviously magical and showed a smiling picture of his mother. The picture of Lily smiled and winked at Harry before moving a long red strand of hair out of her face and tucked it behind her ear.

Harry smiled back at the picture before taking the gold chain that accompanied the locket and putting it over his neck.

"+2 to Charisma, +5 to Charms skill while equipped," Immediately appeared to him when Harry seated the chain about his neck and the locket nestled against his skin and under his shirt, making Harry smile even larger.

"You gained "The Fire Lily's Potion Book," 1/2 of a set," The tutorial read when Harry pulled the next item out of the chest. Harry's eyes lit up and he cracked open the book, a potions book similar to what he remembered of the Half-Blood Prince's book, yet the writing in this book was neat and tidy with a bit of a cursive curl to the words that showed a feminine touch. "Plus +10 to Potioneering skill, +10 to Charms, you learned the potions recipe: "Revenge of the Red Head" "Have you been pranked? Don't just prank back, get revenge! Strike fear into your pranking enemies by reversing their genitals and imbuing a polyjuice like quality which makes them look like their mother; Warning potion only works on males." The potions description made Harry subconsciously cross his legs while turning the page from the potion section and into an area that was covered in Charms' notes. Still, Harry gained an evil smirk when he thought of the possibility of getting one over on the Weasley twins.

"You learned the spell "Homeworkicus Doneicus Alreadycus! If you know the answers, cast the spell at the parchment and it will write your homework for you. No reason to tire out your hand if you already know what you want to write."

"Woot! Thanks mom!" Harry cheered, only realizing he was being too loud and quickly looked back towards the crawl space's door to see if he had been heard.

Fortunately it didn't look like he'd been heard so he continued to look through the chest.

Unfortunately, it only had one other book in it, but then again, it was an ability book called, "The Charmed Theory." A magical theory book that gave Harry another +2 to Wisdom when combined with his first chosen perk.

"Best perk ever." Harry smirked as he pocketed the book in his inventory before quickly looking through the rest of the loot in the trunk.

Harry shoved the books and a few pictures of his mother and her friends into his inventory but left her school robes behind as they were the only thing left in the chest and Harry wasn't into cross-dressing. The golden light from the chest extinguished when Harry shut the lid.

Harry crawled through the dark until his fingers found the door to the crawl space.

Carefully opening, crawling into the closet, then carefully shutting the crawlspace door, Harry's mind was thinking about his parents and especially his mother.

At least that's the excuse he would use for how he missed Vernon standing looking into the now open closet and down at Harry.

"BOY…!?" Vernon's voice pitched up in a questioning rage filled yell, causing Harry to spin around and face Vernon.

"Are You Threatening Me?! Perk triggered, Incendio!

Harry's eyes went wide open.

Vernon glared down at Harry, only to get a face full of fire and scream in pain. Vernon's mustache and bushy eyebrows caught fire and his face was cooked to a nice lobster read as the flames licked at his hair, eyebrows and mustache.

"Enemy is weak to Magic! Critical Hit! 25 Points of Fire Damage!"

A green bar appeared over Vernon's head and the green bar dropped into the red until only 1 hit point was left but then stopped there even though Vernon's health bar now read 1/25. The damage should have killed Vernon in one hit, only for some reason it didn't.

Vernon reeled back screaming and slapping at his flaming eyebrows and mustache just as a tutorial popped up in Harry's vision.

"The Unkillable" the tutorial popped up in Harry's vision, an overlay of details in Harry's view as he sprinted past Vernon for freedom.

"Congratulations on fighting an enemy that currently can't be beaten." The tutorial began to explain, "Some characters like the Vernon Dursley can be attacked and even stunned, but they cannot be killed or defeated as they are integral for story progression. Other characters are just too uber to be fought until you find their weakness, best to find a way to defeat them without attempting stand up combat. Also of note, some enemies become more powerful when enraged; we thought you should know that Vernon Dursley is one of them. That said, good luck… you'll need it."

"Oh Shite, Oh Shite, Oh Shite, Oh Shite." Harry screamed as he sprinted down the upstairs hallway, jumped as he reached the top of the stairs and sailed downwards skipping the stairway and cushioning his landing by impacting the wall before spinning off said hard surface and heading for the door.

"RAAAAAAAGGGGH!" The sound of an enraged behemoth sounded from upstairs, causing the women in the living room to spill their tea just as a little boy bounced off the wall across from the living room and left black streak-marks on the wallpaper from his combat boots before sprinting out the front door of the house.

The entire house shook with the power of Vernon's footfalls as the heavy man picked up speed; like a dwarf, not very worrisome when it came to a marathon run, but very dangerous over short distances.

Harry slammed the door open so hard it ricochet off the wall and slammed shut behind him. With that Harry hit the front stoop of the house and started bunny jumping, only getting to the driveway before the front door exploded off of its hinges at the power of Vernon's enraged state.

"Shite, Shite, Shite, Shite!" Harrys cursing was prefaced by every jump he took as a still smoking Vernon saw Harry and came right for him; gaining on Harry despite Harry's speed, stamina, and strength grinding.

For you see Vernon Dursley was a min/max character, and all his stats were in Strength with a smattering in Charisma and only enough points in Intelligence to make sure he remembered to breathe and to which Grunnings' Executives he needed to brown nose.

"This isn't working!" Harry screamed to himself as he attempted to bounce a zig zag pattern, remembering something Hermione had once said in a rant about survival around alligators and other animals that didn't corner quickly.

Unfortunately for Harry an enraged Vernon did not appear to be one of those enemies and was undaunted by Harry's evasive maneuvers.

Vernon caught up to Harry and lunged for the little boy in an attempt to crush him.

"I didn't Save!" Harry screamed in fear and ducked into a crouch while covering his head and closing his eyes.

Only nothing happened.

There was no crushing blow, no fist to the face and no foot to the ribs.

Harry popped an eye open, only to see an enraged Vernon breathing deeply, purpled and burnt face and pulsing vein in the forehead, singed mustache and eyebrows and a distinct smell of burnt hair, standing right next to Harry but seemingly at a loss for a target.

"Where did that little freak go?" Vernon growled between deep heaves of breath. The large man looked right over Harry's head and then started to stalk back in the direction of Privet Drive as if looking for Harry.

Harry blinked, and then smiled, for apparently Vernon hadn't put any points into Dexterity and thus had lost sight of Harry upon Harry entering sneak mode.

Harry crept silently behind Vernon listening as the man continued to question where Harry had gone.

A good fifteen meters back towards the Dursleys' house, and Harry blinked.

When Harry again opened his eyes, well in sight of the Durlsey residence, Harry was silently startled to see that Vernon was once again fully healthy and back to normal and the front door of the house was fully repaired.

"Hmmm, I must have been mistaken. Now what was I doing?" Vernon asked himself before shrugging and heading to his car that was in the driveway. "Well then, back to work." Vernon finished aloud.

Harry smiled as he followed Vernon all the way to the door of Vernon's car, totally unseen and now safe from Vernon's anger.

"+1 to Sneak!" Popped up in Harry's vision, followed by a new title.

"TaDa! 100 Sneak skill completed! You've gained the title, "The Shadow!" Only the shadow knows what type of trouble you will get up to. Enemies will lose sight of you if you crouch down during combat, giving you the ability to break line of sight attacks, get a head start when running away, or quickly losing unwanted attention. +10 to pickpocket and lockpicking when attempted while sneaking and hidden in the shadows."

Harry smirked; even if he couldn't off the Dursleys, things weren't that bad after all.

* * *

The School library; a bastion of learning. That might have been how Hermione would have seen the building, but to Harry it was the solitary confinement wing in a prison for children; the chief tool in the formation of bricks for the wall. Staffed by murderous librarians and teachers of yet unknown powers Harry wasn't fooled for a moment by its cheery façade of finger-paintings strung on yarn through the halls, sunflowers and daisies planted in the windows, and the occasional alphabet poster showing A's shaped like Apples and B's shaped like Bumblebees.

No, in Harry's eyes, this place was evil, and Harry was here to conquer it. Nothing stood in the way of Harry and his quest for skill grinding advancement.

Harry had circled the building and once again found all of the doors locked. Still, his search hadn't been for loss as rather than the main door he had been tossed out of, he found a door that was labeled simply "Library." A door which must have been the public access to the Little Whinging community at large but was locked during public hours in violation of public code 34d.25.36; which also happened to be the dimensions for the January Playboy centerfold in the year the regulation was published.

Harry looked at the lock and a display popped up above it reading, "Simple," denoting the difficulty as being that which a simpleton could get on a first try.

Of course that means that Harry broke his first five Hairpins; he wouldn't be the programmer's spittoon if things had gone right the first time. Still, Harry was able to bump the lock's pins up and into the right locking position after twenty minutes of cursing and fiddling with the persnickety lock and flimsy little metal hairpins.

Harry crept into the library very very quietly, not letting the door slam shut or even click as it closed. As quietly as a Malfoy house elf that didn't want to have to iron its ears, Harry slipped through the bookshelves, sticking to the shadows as he hunted his prey.

Pulling out his Surrey Slugger, Harry slowly pulled it back over his head, bit his lip with concentration, and then whipped it down with all his strength.

"Head Shot! Critical Hit! Librarian Defeated, gain 50 Experience, Key to the Library, 50 pounds muggle, and Copy of Kama Sutra; the illustrated edition."

"Damn!" Harry briefly broke the quiet when he saw what he had gained in his loot. Startled by his own voice breaching the quiet Harry quickly looked around to see if he had been heard, but he figured he was safe when he wasn't immediately mobbed by Librarians like he had been the last time.

"Save game." Harry mumbled before looking at his loot again and shaking his head at the pictures in the illustrated Kama sutra; a seventies styled version with pictures of men with copious chest hair and mustaches and women with very all-natural growth down under.

"+1 to Flirting" Popped up into his vision when he opened the book. Apparently it was an item not unlike a skillbook that gave Harry skills. Still, Harry was now questioning what he didn't know about bibliophiles and trying to keep thoughts about Hogwart's Madame Prince out of his head.

'_Still, this has possibilities with Hermione.'_ Harry thought to himself with a little smirk, for though he was in a 4 year old body, his mind still remembered what it was like to be a teenager.

"It's always the quiet ones." Harry shook his head as he pocketed the book in his inventory and swapped out his Surrey Slugger and armed his Hufflepuff Shovel.

The near silent "shlop!" sound was soon followed by a "+1 Herbology!" in Harry's vision as he got rid of the evidence of his crime and pocketed the fertilizer. Then Harry was back on the hunt.

* * *

Harry was out of Hairpins. In fact, he had wasted the last 20 Hairpins and still hadn't been able to pick the lock on the cases behind the Head Librarian's desk and which housed the six Stat bonus books. He had however gained an additional +5 to his lockpicking skill and another 4 piles of fertilizer from defeating the librarians; not to mention he was now the proud owner of two illustrated kama sutra, one book on Shibari bondage rope tying and two copies of the Story of O for a total of 4 more skill points to Flirting and some new 'reading' material for when he actually hit puberty.

Of course, it was upon thinking of saving the material for later that his brain got hooked up on the word 'saving.'

He started to curse a bloody streak, only to stop, and then smack himself in the forehead.

"Fool." Harry cursed at himself before continuing to speak, "Load last saved game."

The world around Harry blurred and he once again found himself crouched down behind the head librarian with his Surrey Slugger reared back and ready to strike.

"Critical Hit! Knockdown Damage! Groin Stomp Activated!"

"Bwa Ha ha ha!" Harry cheered as he ground the heel of his boot into the head librarian's crotch; it was an equal opportunity attack.

Once again Harry gained the Shibari book, 100 experience, 100 pounds muggle, and 1 library key.

"Kinky buggers." Harry quipped as he pulled the key out of the loot and prepared to drop it in his inventory after once again gaining that 5th point to Flirting.

However it was upon picking up the key that Harry again kicked himself. Well, he did the mental equivalent.

Harry closed his eyes and groaned as he ground his teeth together, opening them again to look at the key in his hands.

Turning to the locked cases Harry tried the key, and sure enough the cases opened up.

It was then that Harry also realized the cases were glass, so he could have just busted the glass and grabbed the books if he wanted versus waste the hairpins and all that time attempting to pick the locks.

"It's a learning experience, a learning experience." Harry growled a mantra to himself as he cracked the books.

"+2 Strength! +2 Dexterity! +2 Constitution! +2 Intelligence! +2 Wisdom! +2 Charisma!" Harry's first chosen perk helped boost the stats more than the +1 he would have normally received, and he thanked his lucky stars he had put enough points into intelligence in the beginning to realize that was the perk he wanted.

Harry set the ability books in his inventory rather than return them to the case, ignoring the part where he was probably stealing them.

Harry almost turned to go study, but then looked back at the cases and the key that was still available sitting there taunting him from his inventory.

Harry looked at the glass and wood book cases.

Then at the inventory.

Then back at the glass cases.

And then Harry smacked himself right between the eyes with the flat of his hand and groaned at his own stupidity.

"Save game." Harry said, locked the glass case with the key and then pulled out a hairpin.

"Hairpin broke! Lockpick failed." The game stated in Harry's vision.

Anybody walking by the library for the next couple hours would probably have been struck with a sense of deja vu as Harry picked the lock, failed, reset the game at his last save until he finally succeeded and was awarded a "+1 Lockpicking!" He'd then save the game and attempt to pick the lock after using the key to lock it back up again, repeating a reload until multiple levels in lockpicking were gained and the cases were easily unlocked. He'd gained an additional +25 to his lockpicking before similar to the problem with the two teenaged hooligans this level of lock wasn't giving him anymore skill points.

Harry put away his hairpins with a smile that he hadn't lost any of his remaining 20, cracked his knuckles before blinking his eyes vigorously to give them some moisture after staring at the lock for so long. He saved the game, and then stretched.

"Yawn! So bored." Harry groaned out a yawn of boredom and not due to a lack of rest. Rolling his neck he looked around the library and gave a half-hearted shrug and a smile, it was time to study the old fashioned way.

With a clap of his hands, Harry hit the books.

* * *

Harry exited the school at what would have been comparable to four and a half weeks later if time had actually moved; he was milking this tutorial level like Hagrid milked the famous Hogwarts twenty-teated magical cows. In short, he was making the tutorial program his bitch doing everything he could to milk the fixed time for all that it was worth.

After leveling up his lockpicking as high as he could with the locks available, Harry had hit the books for the equivalent of a week's time before boredom drove him to go sneaking through the school on a scavenger hunt.

He had first gone through the school and searched for items of use, which there were surprisingly few. Twelve boxes of chocolate milk from the cafeteria, one regular cricket bat from the athletic offices and three skill books was the extent of his loot: +3 to French language, +3 to Dancing, and +3 to Muggle Studies. Then he had gained Muggle Studies levels the hard way, by picking up books and reading until he couldn't read any more. The game mechanics of the tutorial level helped him, as it appeared that the programmers hadn't expected a four year old Harry Potter to make it to the school. Thus Harry was able to study continuously for just over four weeks non-stop; no need for bathroom breaks, no need for food, no need for sleep as time didn't move at all.

Reading for that long in the library left him feeling loopy, fruity, cakey, and not unlike one big nargle infested fruitcake, if that makes any sense.

Still, he was weary and while his stamina bar and hearts were full his eyes and throat felt dry and scratchy like he had used one of the Weasley Weeze products, "Guaranteed to get you out of Class, or our names aren't Gred and Forge." His back was sore from being hunched over the library's desk and the main piles of muggle books. And it was that after reading for approximately 4 weeks straight his brain felt as wooly as if Dumbledore had hidden his sock collection between Harry's ears. However there were benefits.

Harry stretched and felt his back pop as the last of the bonuses scrolled up his vision.

"Muggle Studies +1! Muggle Studies now at 100! +1 Intelligence. Ta-Da! Gained Title, "I am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General!" Congratulations, you've information vegetable, animal and mineral, you know the kings of England, and can quote the fights historical, your very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical. Yes, that's right, you've become the ultimate know it all. If you are asked a mundane question of fact, or potentially even fiction, you will have an answer; even if you are pulling it out of your arse. Gain +5 to Charisma and open up the dialogue option of "Baffle Them With Bullshit!"

Harry wrenched his body to the right, and then to the left, twisting his arms around his body as his back made horrible crackling sounds as it popped into place and wasn't stiff anymore.

Bouncing on his feet a few times, Harry again pumped himself up as he had now completed all of his objectives other than finishing the remaining Dursley and Kneazle missions, and defeating Mr. Tibbles.

"Whelp, no time like the present. Pip pip tally-ho and all that wrot!" Harry smirked and bounced away down the street.

* * *

And then there were two, as in two kneazle missions with a total of three missions left. Well, to be fair Harry had finished the other two Dursley Chore missions and advanced the time to one oclock in the afternoon. The missions hadn't provided that much experience as Harry realized that they were built for him under the expectation that he wouldn't be sitting at Level 5 and almost Level 6 at the end of the tutorial. To top off the lack of real experience gained, the chore missions were bloody boring. But at this point Harry would do whatever it took to level up, because Mr. Tibbles was going to die before he left the level.

For his efforts, Harry had spent time weeding the yard for just a gain of experience, and then an hour spent shoveling fist sized rocks into his inventory rather than completing the other Dursley mission. That's not to say that he didn't eventually get to using the infinite pile of round river rocks associated with the Dursley's Chore mission titled a boring "Put in a stone path." Harry had just learned to collect everything he could that was worthwhile, especially after he learned that the rocks could be used for other things than just a winding garden path.

The mission itself was just as boring as its title sounded as Harry had started the mission only to grow bored halfway through it. Carrying loads of river rocks and laying them four inches deep was heavy backbreaking child labor, even for an abnormally strong 4 year old. Add to that the shear monotony of moving rocks and the fact that the Dursley's hadn't even given him a shovel, and you get the idea that they were trying to drive Harry mad; or at least more crazy than he seemed to becoming since his restart on life.

Thank Merlin Harry had already earned the Hufflepuff Shovel to make things easier. Still, even shoveling rocks was boring, but then Harry had learned the joys of throwing rocks. In a piqué of anger Harry had started throwing rocks at the dirt area the Dursley's wanted filled, only to see a message pop up into his vision.

"+1 Ranged" The message had said, and when Harry had gone to his Stats and looked at the skill, he learned that it allowed him to hit targets from a distance with a ranged weapon. The higher the skill, the better his accuracy and distance he could target… and the real kicker was, it worked for magic also.

"Dead Eye Dick" Was the title he had earned upon reaching 100 ranged skill after the equivalent of a day of doing nothing but throwing stones at the dirt target area where the Dursleys wanted their path.

The new title went on to explain just what the "Dead Eye Dick" title meant for Harry, or apparently for his future significant other.

"Dead Eye Dick. Your ability to hit targets at range makes you every lady's dream, a man who will never miss the toilet when he stands up to pee. That and you now gain the ability to briefly slow down time to aim your ranged attacks for body parts of your enemy; Headshots do 50% more damage and you now have the ability to disarm your opponents by either knocking weapons out of their hands or just disarming them literally by targeting their arms. You decide which bonus is more impressive, but the lady's love a man who doesn't leave the seat wet." The description was quite mocking, but still it did provide some benefits.

And now, Harry had a date with a kneazle, or at least a battle. Heck, Harry just wanted to live to see the day Mr. Tibbles bit the dust.

* * *

"Herding Cats." Harry's screen lit up with the word when he got within five feet of Ms. Figg.

"Oh Harry, there you are dear." Ms. Figg turned and smiled at Harry as he approached. It was weird, her smile and reaction looked extremely fake and 2 dimensional as if she was some sort of 2 dimensional painting of the lady he thought he knew.

"Hello Ms. Figg." Harry replied with a smile, he was about to keep talking when she interrupted him as if he hadn't greeted her at all.

"You simply must help me. I tried to change the catfood and now none of the kneazles will let me anywhere near them. If you could just get them into the house without hurting them, I'd be able to show them that I bought kitty treats to make it up to them. Will you help me?" Ms. Figg asked, looking down at Harry.

A floating Y and an N appeared in the air in between Ms. Figg and Harry and Ms. Figg smiled at Harry and gave him a big solid stare while she waited for his response.

Harry cringed as Ms. Figg just stared at him, totally unblinking and unmoving; not even seeming to breathe.

Harry shifted to the right, disquieted by the look he was getting from Ms. Figg as she just stared at him with that fixed look and smile.

Ms. Figg's body pivoted as if on an axel so her face was still pointed at Harry; she hadn't moved here legs or torso or even her head, she just stared right at him still smiling that same now quite creepy smile.

"Uh," Harry paused, while taking a step back.

Ms. Figg's body moved forward, keeping the same distance between them.

Harry darted to the left, Ms. Figg's body followed.

Harry tried to run a circle around her, only for Ms. Figg to spin around like a top.

"You're freaking me out lady!" Harry yelled running zig zag patterns and loops, yet continually followed by the woman who was seemingly frozen in the rigor mortis of a smile and question.

"Ah! Alright, alright yes I'll herd your cats! Just stop it already!" Harry finally screamed in a panic.

In a blink, Harry was standing back where he and Ms. Figg had started.

"Oh good, you're such a nice boy Harry." Ms. Figg smiled and moved to pat Harry on the head, only for Harry to dart away from her hand.

A set of numbers popped up in Harry's vision showing that he had wrangled zero out of nine cats into the house; a message popped up that stated that each cat could take no damage from Harry in the process.

"Right Ms. Figg, got to get working on those cats." Harry replied quickly as he turned and hopped over to the closest cat, a big black colored kneazle that looked to weight somewhere around 30 pounds.

Harry went to reach for the kneazle and was suddenly face to face with a hissing spitting hackle raised cat that was definitely showing its disinterest in Harry picking it up; claws extended, back up in an arch and mouth open as it let out a long threatening "rrrrRRRooooooW."

Harry put up his hands to show that he didn't mean any harm and slowly backed away, "Nice kitty, no pulling a Mr. Tibbles kitty, I'm not supposed to hurt you kitty so don't make me." He finished the last one with a growl of his own, which didn't help his situation.

Backing up a good five steps, the kneazle finally stopped hissing and clawing at the air in Harry's direction and then settled down with a silent glare at Harry.

"Fine, be that way. I'll save you for last." Harry groused, only his situation didn't get any better.

Eight different cats later, eight identical reactions and Harry had learned the lesson that you don't make cats do anything, you politely invite them into your life so that you may serve their whims and not the other way around.

Harry huffed and crossed his arms as he looked at all the kneazles who were now staring at him, and a part of him thought that perhaps they were smirking a bit.

"Wish I could get a hint here." Harry snipped, trying to figure out how to get the cats in the house without knocking them over the head and dragging them inside; which was he currently thinking of trying before restarting just so he could burn off some stress.

"Ding!" "A Square Peg In A Round Hole," A tutorial message popped into his vision, and Harry snarled at the not so positive description. However if the title made Harry snarl, the tutorial description itself frustrated him enough to cause him to break out into an immediate bought of childhood petulance; arms crossed and lip sticking out in a pout.

"So, insanity seems to be suiting you." The tutorial started to type across Harry's vision.

"Hey! I'm not insane!" Harry shouted at the tutorial screen.

"Trying the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome, the definition of insanity." The tutorial read, to which Harry had no response but to pout.

"In The Adventures of Harry Potter, the video game, you will receive items which can be used to help you get through missions, puzzles, seemingly unstoppable enemies, and other assorted problems. Some collected items are useless, others have very specific uses. It's up to you to figure out what the correct use for an item is. Good luck!" The tutorial finished and Harry just stayed with his arms crossed and glaring forward until the message finally disappeared.

"Fine, be that way bloody, annoying game system, Inventory." Harry mumbled before order his trunk to appear and began digging through his stuff.

"Hmmm, throwing stones at the cats won't work, though it may be therapeutic, hmmm," Harry spoke to himself, leaning into his inventory trunk and disappearing up to his waist as he hopped up so he could bend over the edge of the floating trunk and dig through the brick-a-brack that he had collected.

"Burnt bacon, nope. Rubber squeaky toy, that's for dogs not cats—Hey, maybe a bait of some sort." Harry shoved items out of his way until he dug his way down to where the single Koi fish was sitting in his trunk.

"Fish, hmm, cat's like fish, right?" Harry asked as he grabbed the squirming fish and wiggled his way backwards out of the trunk until his feet hit the ground.

Harry held the fish in his hands and looked around with an eyebrow raised as all the Kneazles were still ignoring him.

"Hmmm, how do you use the fish as bait?" Harry questioned, not expecting an answer.

Harry certainly didn't expect the game to answer him, or, at least take a literal approach to his words, namely the "use the fish as bait" part. However if the game was going to take his words literally, then of course it would do so to his detriment.

"Fish used as bait!"

The moment the screen stated that, all nine 30 pound kneazles turned as one to look at Harry with a frantic look and licked their chops.

And then they charged.

It's not hard to understand what happens when 270 pounds of Kneazle at a run, and claws first, hit a stationary 38 pound four year old whose hands are busy controlling a large squirming fish.

Harry disappeared under a pile of fur and claws that was attracted towards the bait in Harry's hands.

"Bugger Me!" Harry screamed as he became a pint-sized human scratching pole.

As last words go, it probably rated up there as one of the more ignoble things to put on ones tombstone.

Good thing Harry had saved his game.

* * *

**AN: Well, on to the next chapter and Tibbles the Terrible round 2. Next level sees the end of the tutorial and time pick back up with regular time as Harry skips to the future and right before the Hogwarts letter. I need ideas for an open world Harry Potter video game. I have a bunch but I'm always looking for brain-fodder for my muse. For the sake of gaining ideas, give me mission ideas in both muggle London(the zoo, places throughout the city) as well as Magical (Diagon Alley, St. Mungos, Knockturn Alley, Kings Crossing and platform 9 and 3/4ths, Godrich's Hollow, number 12 (The-Black-ancestral-mansion-which-slips-my-mind-a nd-which-I-can't-look-up-because-I'm-flying-on-a-p lane). Hogwarts, Hogsmead, the Forbidden Forest and Shrieking Shack won't be available for missions until after Harry gets to Hogwarts, and even then he is going to have to sneak out of the castle and not get caught if he wants to go anywhere other than inside Hogwarts or on the approved grounds. So please give me some ideas based on Harry's life in the first book and, you know, missions for those types of places. The rules will be that Harry will have to deal with regular time constraints once again so some missions will have to be bypassed until he gets time to deal with them. Other than that, the world is an open world with limitations on what parts of jolly old England are unlocked. Time will move slower than it should, but he will still be limited in the number of things he can do during a day; that's what time-turners are for after all. Harry is not going to be going to the USA, he's not going on a world tour nor entering some other crossover universe so stick to the places that explicitely exist or are possible muggle locations in the potterverse, so help me out here people. Again, a special thanks goes out to the people who sent me the over 500 reviews, over 30 private messages, and ideas galore for the story. You people rock. Cheers!**


	5. Chapter 5: Every Battle Needs An Plan

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or the characters of his universe, I just play in that sandbox for fun and without pay or any form of remuneration other than reviews and private messages; which are fortunately non-taxable.

**AN: Tremendous ideas people, and thanks for all the reviews I've been getting per chapter; simply amazing the ideas. It really makes me smile to know that I'm making people burst out laughing in public; it makes my slightly evil side cackle maniacally. So I'm looking for information from canon that I can't seem to find and I figured I'd release the question to the HP fandom, Harry's only recorded canon instances of accidental magic were: turning his teacher's hair blue, regrowing his own hair after his aunt cut it, apparition to the school roof, and blowing up his aunt, correct? Anyway, keep up those great ideas and I'll keep the story going. For the record, Harry isn't going to get very long in the muggle world before we see him gaining access to the magical; so don't think that this is one of those stories where he is going to become phenomenal-cosmic-powers in an itty bitty living space before getting to Hogwarts. That's right, I'm saving that until Hogwarts! Just kidding. Keep those ideas coming and hope you enjoy the chapter. Cheers!**

**AN: Not beta read.**

* * *

_'Thoughts are in italics'_

"Things Said, or Things Written"

**Chapter 5: Every Battle Needs An Exacting Plan**

"Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid," Harry cursed at himself as he carried the last of the nine unconscious and happily drugged Kneazles into the house and dumped the large black Kneazle onto the pile of other happily high felines.

"Cat is even in the bloody name, bloody Catnip. Bloody marvelous." Harry shook his head at his own obliviousness to what in hindsight was perfectly clear. Not having played a video game before nor having faced any of these stupid missions in his last go through, he realized that his learning curve would continue to be right and properly steep.

"Bloody learning cliff, I know, let's make a game and see how many times we can make Harry go through life ending or bodily harming tasks, only to tell him the solution after he's already figured it out the hard way!" Harry sarcastically groused to himself as he stomped out of Ms. Figg's back porch area. Apparently the programmer was so lazy that the rest of the house didn't even exist, and all that Harry could enter was a cloakroom or mud area in the back of the house before hitting a solid wall with a pixilated door painted on it.

Harry's foot hit the ground outside the house and received a new message from the game.

"Ding! Mission Successful! 200 Experience awarded and +10 Care of Magical Creatures. Level Up!"

Harry read through a summary of what his hard work had earned him and a smile threatened to show on his face, yet was halted by the thought that next up was his battle with Mr. Tibbles.

"Still, if catnip worked on the other kneazles—" Harry paused his statement while he scrolled his eyes up and down the possible options while in the back of his head possibilities for how to defeat Mr. Tibbles danced in his head.

**Level 6:**

**CURRENT EXP:**7650 **TOTAL EXP NEEDED FOR NEXT LEVEL**:9500

**Health:** 19/19

**Magic:** 400/400

**Ability points to be allocated:** 4

**ABILITIES:**

Strength: 12

Dexterity: 12

Constitution: 6

Intelligence: 17

Wisdom: 10

Charisma: 8 +(2)

**Skill Points to Allocate:**41

**SKILLS:**

Armor Wearing: 5

Care of Magical Creatures: 15

Charms: 10 +(5)

Dancing: 3

Dual-Wielding: 15

French language: 9

Flirting: 5

Herbology: 6

Lock-Picking: 31

Muggle Subjects: 100

Pick-pocket: 6

Potioneering: 10

Ranged: 100

Sneak: 100

Two-Handed: 3

Unarmed: 3

**Comprehending The Incomprehensible.**

**Arrr, Yer a Pirate!**

**I Have The Power**

**Are You Threatening Me?!**

**Perk Points available: **1

**AVAILABLE PERKS**:

**"Hair Like Snape"**

**"Lemon-Drop Addiction"**

**"A Black Gene"**

**"A Summer Job"**

**"Ninja Vanish!"**

**"Creature Comfort"**

**"There Are Some Who Call Me—Tim"**

"**It Was An Accident!"**

"**Dog-gone'it, People Like Me."**

**CRAFTING:**

Cooking: Master Chef

Harry looked first at his abilities and then down at his skill points and smiled as he was really racking up the number of skill points available, so Intelligence was tempting for putting points into. But in the back of his mind Harry was thinking about the lesson he'd learned from the tutorial and from dealing with the kneazles; sometimes you couldn't face an enemy straight on and win. That certainly had held true for Voldemort after the bastard had regained his body, and it had been the same for dealing with the Basilisk and even the dragon.

'_When I think about it, I've never been able to stand toe to toe with the big enemies. It's always been working around them and working the angle that let me survive, and then just by the skin of my teeth at that.'_ Harry thought to himself as he scratched his chin and looked at his options and actually gave himself a moment to think.

Now a non-ambitious, small-of-wit, mundane or muggle human of about age fourteen or fifteen who had dropped out of high school and basically didn't do anything with their lives but live in their parent's basement, they would probably have had an intelligence of somewhere less than 6. At age 4, this Harry Potter had an Intelligence score of 17, which should mean that it wouldn't come as a complete shock that every now and then Harry would come up with a good idea.

Harry's eyes shot wide open as his hand that had been tapping his chin stopped just as his mouth dropped open, and he paused; the gears in his brain churning at furious speeds as if he had two hamsters spinning on their wheels rather than just one.

"If I max out strength." Harry stated before pausing, his mouth closing with a snap as his hand flicked up to where the inventory tab was showing floating in his vision, and the inventory trunk was suddenly superimposed in front of his face.

Soon the weapons tab was opened and Harry looked at the fist sized River Rocks he had shoveled into his trunk, showing he had ammunition of 3841 River Rocks available.

"Ranged attack: Negative 1 to hit due to nonstandard form, 5 Damage plus strength," Harry read the description of the River Rocks and smiled, his idea coming together.

Harry quickly looked at the perks tab and read through the new perks that had become available, just checking to make sure that his course of action shouldn't vary based on the new options. What he first saw made him salivate, but he was still going to stick with the plan.

"**There Are Some Who Call Me—Tim**," Was an impressive perk indeed and it made Harry's budding pyromaniac side drool. "Back in the depths of time, during the reign of King Arthur and his Knights of Camelot lived a wizard devoted to the wielding of all things fire magic, and this mighty mage's name was—Tim. This perk becomes available after choosing "Are You Threatening Me?!" and is the next step in gaining true mastery over fire based magic. By becoming the heir to the great wizard Tim you gain the ability to launch Fireballs from your magical foci and immolate your foes with the Flaming Pillars of Fire; the capital letters are important to note. Perk power requires a wand or magical foci. By choosing this spell you gain the "Fireball" and "Pillar of Fire" spells which are special to this perk; also all fire related spells take half the magic they normally would to cast or overpower."

Harry almost broke down and bought that perk right there and then, but instead slapped himself in the face to bring back his focus before wiping the drool off his chin.

"Focus Harry! Focus! You can get that perk later when you actually have a wand and can use it." Harry told himself, taking a big breath of air to calm himself before focusing on the other two new perks.

"**It Was An Accident!"** Harry read, his eyes panning over the perk and smiling at a very fond memory of a Marge Dursley blowing up into a blimp like state and flying out the kitchen doors. The perk read, "Is accidental magic really accidental if you control the outcome? This perk increases your chance of having boughts of accidental magic by 50%. Additionally, 25% of the time your magic does act 'accidentally' something positive for you will happen. Of course you don't have full control over your wandless magic yet so 25% of the time something negative will happen; the other 50% is a crapshoot. Still, this is the first step to controlling your magic without needing a wand, so who wants to plan some accidents?"

Harry made a mental note to look at that perk again sometime in the future but stated "No" for that perk also and looked at the last one.

"**Dog-gone'it, People Like Me**," was definitely a perk for the type of person who wanted to talk their way out of a situation, or into somebody's pants, and it probably explain why Sirius Black had been known as a lady's man back in the day despite his being widely known as a cad and immature prankster. Memories of his godfather made him smile while he continued to read the perk. "Dogs are a man's best friend, or a woman's in most cases where diamonds or credit cards aren't available. With this perk you gain the power of the "Puppy Dog Eyes." When you fail a conversation and don't get your way the Puppy Dog Eyes power allows you to unleash the power of pure cuteness in an attempt to melt the person's heart and have them follow your will. You also gain a +5 to Charisma."

The perk wasn't going to help Harry with Mr. Tibbles, and it also brought to mind the fact that Sirius was currently wrongfully imprisoned. That part made him frown, but the invisible walls around this stupid tutorial zone made that point mute as he had to get out of the level before he could even think about helping Sirius.

And standing between the end of the level and Harry was Mr. Tibbles.

"One point to Intelligence so I can gain another skill point, three to strength to up it to 15 so the rock's hopefully do close to 20 damage, don't assign any skill points, and for a perk I choose **Ninja Vanish!**" Harry finished the last part with a smirk.

Mr. Tibbles wouldn't know what hit him, literally.

…Ok, hopefully. Maybe at best.

* * *

Harry saved the game outside the hedge that hid the kneazle arena and the mission "Nine Lives" starring the evil kitten known simply as Mr. Tibbles.

"Whew, I can do this." Harry inhaled a big breath, steeled himself, let out the air he had been holding in, and then sprinted through the hedges so that he could get to the mission before he lost his nerve.

Harry shoved his way through the hedge, armed his River Rocks in his right hand, and punched the mission exclamation point while ignoring the stirring in the kneazles in the arena's tiers above him.

"Here kitty kitty." Harry started, a resolute look on his face that wavered for a moment as the thorny gate across from him dropped into the earth and the thuds of Mr. Tibble's footsteps vibrated through the kitty litter spread beneath his feet.

"Come on Mr. Tibbles—and please don't eat my face this time." Harry's quiet voice quivered as the cute kitten with the pink bow exited the shadows and sat across from Harry and once again began to lick its dainty paw just like the last time Harry had died a horrible death in the arena.

Harry called up his inventory, and while he frantically dug through his inventory for his supply of catnip, the game intruded on his search.

"Mr. Tibbles attacks with Baleful Glare! Instant Death in Two Rounds."

"Shite! Shadow perk don't fail me now!" Harry yipped as a cold sweat broke out on his forehead and in his armpits as his hand finally closed around a clump of catnip.

Harry jerked his hand out of his inventory and reared back his hand that held the catnip.

Time slowed down for just an instant as Harry aimed his throw towards Mr. Tibbles, all the while quietly praying, "Don't pee myself, don't pee myself, don't pee myself and please let this Work!" The last was said with a grunt of effort as he released his green clump of leafy cat narcotics at his tormentor.

The leafy projectile seemed to glide through the air in slow motion.

Mr. Tibbles stopped grooming his paw mid lick and turned his head to glare at Harry, and Harry watched in slow motion as claws slowly slipped from said dainty paw.

"I'm-still-a-virgin-don't-kill-me!" Harry rapidly screamed in fear and his eyes went large as he ducked and covered while mentally kissing his arse goodbye.

Just as the catnip hit Mr. Tibbles in the face.

"Catnip Activated!"

A minute passed before Harry peaked out of from under his hands to see why he hadn't been shredded yet, and he was secretly glad that he hadn't peed himself. That's when he saw what was equally parts the scariest and cutest sight he had ever seen.

"Mrow." The slightly befuddled sound slipped out of the white kitten's throat as Mr. Tibbles looked glassy eyed, big kitten eyes blinking and cute little pink nose twitching for almost thirty seconds with his clawed paw still held in the air.

"Baleful Glare canceled! Lost sight of target!" The words flashed before the crouching Harry's eyes and hope began to grow in Harry.

Harry kept his focus on Mr. Tibbles, looking for any type of reaction.

A reaction is what he got.

"Mreow! Purrrrrrrr," Mr. Tibbles' eyes focused down to the catnip on the ground and the little kitten pounced on it and began to rub his face deep into the catnip before closing his eyes and nuzzling the clump of greenery.

"Awe, how cute." Slipped from Harry's mouth, only for him to realize what he had said and slap himself.

"No, bad Harry! Bad. Evil cute kitten must die." Harry derided himself, giving himself a slap to the face again as he slowly crept around behind the now snoozing kitten and into the shadows of the tunnel entrance where Tibbles had originally entered.

A quiet 'whoosh' sound prefaced Harry's stealthy entrance into the shadows, and Harry quietly chuckled as his Ninja Vanish perk activated.

"Stats." Harry whispered, and sure enough, the hiding in the shadows added an additional +20 to Harry's sneak skill thanks to the perk; an extra 20 points that stacked on top of his already 100 maxed out sneak skill.

Harry looked down at his hand while in the shadows, or at least where his now invisible hand should have been, and then grinned evilly as he reared back with the River Rock that was still in his other hand, and aimed at the comatose Mr. Tibbles' head.

"With all these perks and bonuses, this should finish off that cat." Harry said with an evil chuckle, before releasing the stone right at Mr. Tibbles' head.

"River Rock Misses!"

"Shite!" Harry screamed, rightly so because in an instant Mr. Tibbles was no longer comatose but instead looking right at the shadows of the gate.

Mr. Tibbles's cute little nose sniffed twice, and his eyes focused right on where Harry was hiding even though Tibbles couldn't see Harry.

"You made Mr. Tibbles Angry! Mr. Tibbles counter attacks!"

Neighbors throughout Little Whinging cringed as the air was suddenly split by the sounds of a child screaming as his genitals were introduced to the equivalent of a cute and cuddly woodchipper.

* * *

Harry attempted the mission another three times and failed painfully each and every one of them. He tried several different ways of gaining initiative or attacking tibbles from the shadows and failed miserably.

Harry tried hitting the mission start and then sprinting for the side of the gate where he crouched and pressed his back against the wall until Mr. Tibbles entered the arena. A quick step into the shadows and then attacked with both of his switchblades, however Harry instead saw Mr. Tibbles show Harry the true meaning of the "Sewing machine" attack via tiny teeth and claws stitching a path up and down Harry's body.

Harry attempted a second time by sprinting for the shadows and then hid in them as Mr. Tibbles passed, only for Tibbles to sniff Harry out.

Thus Harry learned the lesson that sometimes battles with video game bosses was all about the timing. Also of note was that getting within two feet of Mr. Tibbles was the equivalent of being within two feet of a nuclear explosion.

In short, after that little fiasco there wasn't a lot left of Harry, but at least he had died quickly.

Harry tried the mission again but this time he tried to nail Mr. Tibbles with the Catnip at the exact moment the cat exited the shadows.

Unfortunately for Harry, his "Woot!" of success was a bit premature.

Apparently a stoned and high Mr. Tibbles was in the habit of using his scratching post when drugged on catnip. Due to the fact that Mr. Tibbles had left his scratching post at home, the kitten decided to use Harry as a substitute as Harry attempted to sneak by the stoned kitten into the shadows to gain his attack bonuses.

"The catnip is the key." Harry groused as he picked himself up off the dark floor of the menu screen and reloaded his saved game after the third failure.

"Hmm, maybe if I get the catnip set up in the path of Tibbles it will automatically trigger when the little demon cat gets in range?" Harry mumbled to himself as he entered the arena from the hedge lined path.

Harry threw his catnip where he knew Mr. Tibbles would show up then hit the exclamation point for the Nine Lives mission.

"Yes!" Harry cheered his success the moment the kitten exited the shadows and immediately pounced on the catnip before entering a drugged state.

The only problem was that Mr. Tibbles was again right next to the shadowed area, and Harry had already learned the problem with getting too close to the kitten.

"Shite! Reload." Harry groused, kicking the kitty litter at his feet and reloading from his saved game.

The world around Harry blurred and once again he was outside the bushes.

"Fiddle, liddle, stupid, mother, pus bucket and Helga Hufflepuff's hairy nipples." Harry cursed under his breath as he stomped through the hedges.

"So drop the catnip in the center of the arena, wait till Tibbles is stoned, crouch to dodge the baleful glare, hope that Are You Threatening Me doesn't trigger and miss, sneak into the shadows and then try to hit the little kitten in its freaking little head!" Harry started talking through his plan of attack only to get frustrated at the idea of trying to headshot a kitten that was only about twelve centimeters tall; roughly half a foot.

"Fuzzball from hell's head is only the size of a bloody apple, would be bloody easier if its head was the size of Dobby's." Harry grumbled to himself while briefly thinking about his onetime stalker, onetime friend, Dobby the house elf. Harry would never contemplate throwing stones at Dobby, well, except for that time Dobby tried to kill him with a Bludger. Still, Dobby was a perfect example of a small creature with a nice melon sized target for a head.

Harry kept going over the shear impossibility of winning this battle and the size of the target he had to hit, with a River Rock that gave -1 to hit at that, when he got stuck on the thought of the size of the kitten's head right as he got in front of the mission exclamation point.

"Wait a second." Harry paused, his hand a mere inch from touching the exclamation point as the thoughts in his head churned at the speed of dual hamsters.

Harry's eyes went large, and then his head tipped back in a cackle.

"Bwa ha ha ha ha ha! Options menu! Cheat Codes! Activate Bobble-Heads." Harry's evil cackling filled the arena. Apparently dying so many times to a kitten, and to old lady librarians before that, was having an adverse effect on Harry's sanity.

"Beep! Bobble-Heads activated."

Harry felt a sensation as if he had suddenly grown a foot as the ground was suddenly further away from where he looked down at it, yet his hands and body appeared to stay the same size as his original four year old frame.

Touching his face Harry griped at the effect of the cheat code.

"Feels like I'm trying to smuggle coconuts in my cheeks. Woah! Steady now." Harry shook his head in exasperation after feeling his cheeks and forehead that had swollen to about ten times the size they were before. Unfortunately by shaking his head, his vision started to bobble around as the Bobble-Head spring effect happened and his world pivoted from side to side; the weight of his head causing Harry to stumble from his left to his right until he finally steadied out.

Harry slowly turned his body and bent backwards so that his head wouldn't shake, and he looked up at the kneazles in the audience only to see that all of them looked like they had suddenly grown a thyroid problem; each cat and kneazle looked like they had an extra-large pumpkin or watermelon sized head and it was more than a little creepy considering they kept their same small cat-sized bodies.

Harry smiled and nodded to himself, only to feel his head bob forward, the weight of it dragging him forward into the exclamation point and starting the mission.

"Woah nelly, stop the world I want to get off!" Harry grabbed both sides of his wobbling head and held it steady just as the gates crashed down in front of him and the thud's of Mr. Tibble's feet echoed across the gladiatorial arena.

"Eep! Inventory, come on catnip don't fail me now." Harry finally got his head under control grabbed the catnip out of the inventory and threw it into the center of the arena just as the giant head of Mr. Tibbles pierced the veil of shadows that was the opposite entrance into the arena.

Unfortunately, throwing things caused Harry's head to wibble wobble again.

Fortunately, the catnip landed right where it needed to, and Mr. Tibbles proceeded to the center of the arena and then immediately 'Glomp' the catnip the moment his now large pink nose smelled it.

"Catnip Activated!"

"Freaking weird looking." Harry mumbled to himself as he crept quietly around the outside of the arena, keeping his eyes on the freakishly big headed kitten which now sported a head the size of a full grown lion and a pink ribbon to match but with a teeny tiny kitten body holding the head up beneath.

Harry had to keep both of his hands on his head as he moved to keep the thing from beginning to bobble, but he finally made his way into the shadows of the gate and noticed his body disappear.

"Ok, I hope this works." Harry said to himself, arming his River Rock, pulling his hand back to aim while biting his temporarily large tongue in between his freakishly large teeth.

"Hgnph!" Harry threw the rock with all his might at Mr. Tibbles head.

"Head Shot! Catnip negates armor class! Critical hit! Plus bonus damage from Perks, Powers, and Skills! Mr. Tibbles Killed!"

The rock hit Mr. Tibbles right upside the head, causing the kitten's grotesquely large Bobblehead to wibble wobble as the cat suddenly stopped playing with the catnip and tipped over dead.

"Woo Hoo! He's dead! I Win, you lose! I win, You Suck!" Harry shouted, jumping up in the air and pumping his arm in delight; even though it couldn't be seen because he was still basically invisible while still in sneak mode and in the shadows.

Harry's happy dance was halted and he immediately felt a chill come over him as a voice echoed through the arena.

"I Live AGAIN!" A ghastly voice rattled Harry's teeth as fire shot up from the corpse of Mr. Tibbles and the smell of sulfur and brimstone filled the air.

"Round Two!" Cheerfully flashed before Harry's eyes, and Harry's giant bobblehead mouth dropped open while it was still bobbling from side to side in aftershocks from his earlier happy dance.

"No way—" Harry's words died on his lips as a wave of flame shot out from Mr. Tibble's corpse and incinerated the front entrance from where Harry had original started the mission. By happenstance or faulty coding, the only place in the arena protected from the cone of fire that sped across the arena was the thorny entrance tunnel for Mr. Tibbles. The very spot where Harry happened to be was the location in the arena where he was safe from the area of effect attack.

A crack in the earth appeared in the middle of the arena and black ooze the consistency of tar slid out of the crack before reforming into the shape of a kitten with a large bobble head; ghastly shapes like screaming faces seemed to press up against the surface of Mr. Tibbles' ooze formed body, the faces clawing and screaming to escape the torment from within the kitten.

Harry blanched white and felt his stomach threaten to rebel at the disgusting site of the eldritch horror that was Mr. Tibbles.

Fortunately Harry was still practically invisible in his place hidden in the shadows of the gateway outside the arena floor.

'_Um, uh, holy catnip don't fail me now.'_ Harry thought to himself, not willing to speak for fear of giving himself away as he quietly snatched out another dose of catnip and flung it into the center of the arena.

Mr. Tibble's head swung around to face the direction that the thrown object came from, only to sense the catnip and pounce on that instead.

"Catnip Activated!" The screen flashed.

"Whew." Harry sighed when the horror that was once a kneazle kitten began to devour the catnip and then lay down for a nap; faces of those previously devoured still tracing their way along the black rippling form of the little kitten with the bobblehead.

"Rock paper scissors, I hope the rock wins again." Harry mumbled to himself, aimed for Tibbles' head, and let fly.

"Head Shot! Catnip negates armor class! Critical hit! Plus bonus damage from Perks, Powers, and Skills! Mr. Tibbles Killed!"

"Woot!" Harry cheered as the body of Mr. Tibbles lost shape and appeared to settle into a pool of black ooze which was evaporated by the sun shining down into the arena.

"Round Three!" flashed in front of Harry's eyes.

"You've got to be Fucking Kiddi-" Harry's incredulous statement was cut off by a thunderous KA-BOOM as a plummeting meteorite broke the sound barrier and cratered the center of the gladiator.

Harry ducked his head, attempting to shield his prodigious bobblehead as the meteor hit the ground and caused a rippling wave of earth to travel across the round arena and impact every way with solid thud. A cloud of kitty-litter dust filled the arena shielding the center from view.

And yet again the wave of the attack failed to enter the shadowed gate area where Harry happened to be hiding.

"Heh, screw you programmer." Harry smirked and flipped his two fingers in the direction the meteor had originated.

Harry's smirk was wiped off his face when hundreds of flailing green squid tentacles erupted from the earth across the entire surface of the arena. The tentacles thrashed before receding and sucking back towards the center where they left behind a leathery green skinned kitten with wings and a mouth full of tentacles; looking like the elder god Cthulhu had crossbred with a Kneazle.

"Ew, Hagrid! No more crossbreeding for you." Harry's disgust was covered by him once again throwing catnip.

"Catnip Activated!"

* * *

Nine rounds of combat with the truly terrible forms of Mr. Tibbles.

Nine rounds of facing one eldritch horror after another.

Nine total rounds where there would have been absolutely no chance of winning if it hadn't been for a mix of cheats, powers, perks and the one spot in the arena that wasn't hit by area of effect attacks every time Mr. Tibbles respawned.

The last round had been some evil living black vampiric mist kitten that had sucked the life out of carnivorous plants that had previously been spawned by an earlier version of Mr. Tibbles.

However in the end, there could be only one.

And because he had cheated like his life depended on it, the one was Harry—though the jury was out on whether his sanity had survived the battle.

"You Cheater! Tibbles the Terrible Defeated! Congratulations, cheater, You gained 1500 Experience, +10 to Care of Magical Creatures, 25 Galleons, 25 Pounds muggle, and the Cat's-Paw rare item…Cheater." Flashed in front of Harry's eyes, finally confirming that once and for all Mr. Tibbles was destroyed.

"Oh yes, I win, you lose! Ding dong the demon's dead, which old demon, that old demon! Not going to eat my face again are you! No chewing on these bits again for you kibble tibbles! Huh. Huh. Huh." Harry made lewd thrusting motions towards the dissolving corpse of Mr. Tibbles; motions that sent his head wibble wobbling counter direction to his pelvic thrusts.

"Not so big now are you Mr. Tibbles." Harry danced around the corpse of Mr. Tibbles and taunted the corpse, dancing as if he was doing a rain dance and every bounce of Harry's body made Harry's Bobblehead bounce like a demented jack-in-the-box.

Still, he didn't care. Harry had finally won, and the large white toothed grin on his large bobblehead was proof of his excitement.

Around the arena the kneazles on the raised tiers erupted in a ruckus of meows and other cat sounds in either celebration or sorrow, but Harry wasn't paying attention to the sounds around him nor did he care that he had an audience.

Instead Harry decided to salt the earth where Mr. Tibbles had died, or at least the next best thing to salting the earth.

"Zippp, Ahhhhh." Harry released his bladder on the charred blackened mark in the middle of the arena, rinsing away the last remnants of the creature that had almost given Harry more frights than Voldemort.

"Dee-Do" two new messages popped up in Harry's vision, though he was too busy relieving himself to and focusing on the path of his pee rather than focusing on the words flashing before his eyes.

"Congratulations, you've completed all of the Kneazle missions and gained a new title, "The Cat Whisperer." From this point forward, felines will like you, they'll REALLY like you. Warning, may have odd affects on feline animagus." The first message stated, by this time Harry was too busy just smiling and giggling to himself as he attempted to zip his jeans while the momentum of his bobbling head had him weaving from side to side such that he wasn't even paying attention to the messages.

That is until the second message popped up.

"You gained a new Perk! "**The Call of Cthu-Tibbles**" We don't know how you not only beat Mr. Tibbles the first time but then actually won all nine rounds; nobody was meant to win that battle as it was supposed to teach players that some battles can't be won. Thus for your incredible cheating and glitch exploiting you gain **The Call of Cthu-Tibbles**. Once upon every lunar cycle you may summon a weakened aspect of Mr. Tibbles to join you in combat on the mortal plane for nine minutes. Congratulations cheater, you killed a kitten. You should be proud of yourself—cheater."

Yet despite the chastisement from the game, Harry was in fact proud of himself.

"Options, Cheats, turn off Bobbleheads, and Save Game."

Harry saved just in time.

Just as the game symbol in the corner of his vision denoted that he had successfully saved, Harry's world flashed a uniform bright royal blue color, and then Harry found himself once again in the menu loading screen.

"What the bloody hell?" Harry asked, looking around quickly in the darkness as the floating screen flashed from blue to black, but with only white words in the middle of the screen and not the normal menu prompts.

"Server down for Patch. We appreciate your patience. Would you like to read the patch notes? Y, N?"

Harry blinked, and then blinked again. He had been enjoying his time taunting the corpse of Mr. Tibbles and had planned on enjoying the moment for a bit longer.

Harry shrugged as it seemed that there wasn't anything else to do but wait and read the patch notes.

"What in Merlin's beard are patch notes, hell, what the heck is a patch?" Harry yelled into the darkness, but no reply was forthcoming.

Harry crossed his arms and frowned at the screen, "Fine, yes I'll read your bloody patch notes."

The screen immediately switched, and the patch notes were concise and listed only one glitch that the patch was supposed to fix.

**[Patch 0.1]** To fix a glitch with Mr. Tibbles: Glitch identified with Mr. Tibbles battle, Ruddy Bugger wasn't supposed to be able to win. Fixing error.

"You house-elf cock sock! Bloody wanking bastards call me a cheater!?..."

Well, let's just say that what came out of Harry's mouth for the next hour of patching was even less polite and didn't deserve to be shared outside of the confines of the dark menu screen area.

* * *

**AN: I'll leave it there with the final defeat of Mr. Tibbles. Next chapter sees Harry enter the wide world, and as every game player knows starting a character after the tutorial always has some fun options. What's the weirdest gamestart that you've ever seen? You know, where the game either allows you to tailor your character or provides some cinematic start scene that leaves you saying, "What the hell was that?!" I've already got plans for the start, but I love the ideas you all are coming up with for missions, character interaction, game mechanics, etc. Thank you for all the reviews, messages and brain storming. I'm glad that you're enjoying the story thus far. Cheers! **


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